


All in Her Head

by quirky21



Category: Subnautica (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, BAMF Women, F/F, Lesbian Character, Lesbian Character of Color, Monsters everywhere, Original Character(s), Romance, Space Magic, Survival, definitely a few things you won't see in game, liberties with lore, slightly AU, you really don't have to play the game to enjoy this fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-11-20
Packaged: 2019-11-23 12:55:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 35,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18152141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quirky21/pseuds/quirky21
Summary: Rekha had been perfectly content with her life as an exosuit technician aboard the Aurora. A few friends, a few bedmates, a few credits saved up. She had a quiet, fulfilling life where no one knew her secrets. And then her ship exploded.cross-posted ff.net





	1. Warning

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the Below Zero drop and the Subnautica fanfic In Charge, which is a fantastic story! I borrowed an idea or two, specifically the suit storage and airlocks. I liked how their functions were described.  
> As per my usual style, I'm taking some hefty liberties with lore and the world in general, making changes and additions where it suits :) Enjoy!

As far as crash landings on uncharted alien worlds went, this wasn’t so bad. Sure, the flotation device on her escape pod hadn’t deployed. Yes, the depths to which it had sunk were nerve wracking. And okay, the tiny pod and dark depths were making her feel rather claustrophobic. Other than that, things were fantastic.

Rekha was in great health, aside from a few burns and scrapes that she’d gotten while escaping the  _ Aurora _ . She had a similarly healthy companion. Environmental controls were functioning at full capacity. Their escape pod’s storage had enough food and water for a week plus raw materials for the fabricator to create essential items like reinforced dive suits and high capacity air tanks in case they had to evacuate before help arrived. The radio was sending out their distress call.

Rekha frowned at the lack of incoming transmissions. They’d been down here two days. Someone should have come to check on them by now. Was there an anomaly blocking radio waves? Intentional disruption? Had someone gone to war with Alterra and started with a science ship out in a far arm of the galaxy? Dumb way to start a war. Waste of resources. She frowned out the window into the inky waters. Her reflection frowned back.

“Ugh!” Harrington groaned from her drop seat. She waved her PDA at Rekha. “Dogar, any luck getting your PDA to unlock? I need something other than useless survival tips for entertainment.”

Rekha looked at Dr. Alandris Harrington, senior medical officer and holo-novella junkie. “No. Company-issued PDAs won’t unlock from survival mode until they reconnect with an Alterra AI.” She’d attended enough safety briefings to know that.

“There’s got to be a way.”

“I’m a prawn technician not a programmer, Harrington.”

“Ugh.”

Not the complete truth. Rekha had a custom PDA stowed away that had several hacking programs she could use to reset Harrington’s. She had a whole slew of skills that she didn’t care to be publicly known. Spacecraft piloting, various forms of combat, interrogation, psionics… 

She’d learned most of her not-on-file skills long before she’d bought herself a citizenship in Alterra. The last thing in the galaxy that she needed was people asking about her past. It’d take one hell of a dire situation to expose herself in any way.

Alterrans weren’t famous for their understanding attitudes.

“Fine. I’m going to try and sleep. Pod, lower lights to ten percent.” Harrington laid out on her dive suit, head propped on an arm.

Rekha’s chronometer said it was only 2130. Not very late, but what else was there to do when trapped 328 meters below the surface? She looked back out the little window. As her eyes adjusted, the outside world made itself known. Glowing things flickered in the shadows between huge green orbs. She could sense life out there. Simple and alien, but life. And farther out, she could sense human life. Other survivors. There was a third of the ship’s original compliment, yet most in the same or better circumstances than Rekha. Someone would come for them soon.

Harrington had them up and doing cardio exercises at 0700. Rekha grumbled even though she’d already been awake. She hadn’t slept well. A nightmare about giant sea monsters had snapped her from sleep several hours before. The distinct feeling of unease kept her from going back to sleep. At least the exercise burned an hour.

They ate and drank and Rekha managed to catch an hour nap.

“Hey. Dogar.” Harrington prodded her shoulder. “Did you hear that?”

She yawned and squinted. “What?”

There came the distant groaning songs of what they’d already guessed were whales of some sort.

“Not that. Listen.”

She did. She listened until Harrington sighed and threw up her hands.

“Thought I heard…” Harrington didn’t finish.

Around mid-afternoon, Rekha  _ felt _ what she thought Harrington might have heard. A massive presence that radiated predatory hunger. Not a minute later, the life pod vibrated with the force of its roar.

“That!” Harrington squeaked, immediately clamped a hand over her mouth. She manually dimmed the pod’s light to five percent.

Twitchy with fright, they peered out into the gloom. Light flit among the green orbs. The roar sounded around them again. And again. Louder, closer, making Rekha glad she was already on her knees and pressing close to another human being.

They saw something slide through the darkness. Something big enough to reflect the green orbs’ light and stretch the meters and meters between them. Their breaths came in strangled pants as they struggled to both breathe and make absolutely no noise that might attract that… thing.

Eventually the roars faded and stopped. Rekha remained trembling, would have for a while, except Harrington swore up a blue streak. “We have to get out of here!” She growled. “We have to.”

Yes. Whatever it was, it’d be back. They were in its hunting grounds, and it would find them eventually. Even if it couldn’t break their pod’s plasteel skin, it was big enough to cause a lot of trouble. Roll the squishy humans around inside until someone’s skull popped like a ripe melon. Destroy their radio. Push them to a depth that their pod couldn’t handle. Keep them trapped inside the pod until they died of dehydration.

“As soon as I can feel my legs again. Then we’ll go.” Rekha whispered.

Harrington eyed her. “Yea. We probably shouldn’t wait for it to come back.”

The radio beeped with an incoming message that made them both jump and stare at the window. There wasn’t an answering roar, not even ten minutes later. Rekha looked to Harrington, who glanced at the radio, then back at the window. She shook her head. Nope. They wouldn’t be playing that message. Probably just another survivor distress signal finally making its way to them. 

Alterra comms were the worst. It was a running joke among prawn technicians that if an exo-head sneezed inside their suit, their comms would go down. Instead of live comms to try and organize the survivors, they had to deal with limited distress messages and delayed incoming messages. One would think a corporation that had originally been a weapons manufacturer and distributor would have decent communication systems.

Rekha and Harrington pulled off their Alterra uniforms and squeezed their naked butts into the head to toe dive suits. Feet were stuffed into flippers, tanks hauled onto backs, heads crammed into masks. Harrington checked seals and gauges. Rekha tested the flexibility of her suit. Not bad. She wouldn’t want to fight in it, but hopefully it worked like Alterra prawns instead of comms. It was supposed to protect from extremes in temperature and pressure, to reduce or completely negate the effects of decompression. Or maybe the tanks and mask did the decompression thing. Whichever. They should be fine making a quick ascent from the black depths.

She stuffed her clothes and share of the supplies into the dimensional pocket that her suit used as a storage system. The mass and weight wouldn’t affect her. Same quantum mechanics as used on the prawn storage units, though decidedly smaller. Prawn suits did a lot of heavy mining. Their storage units could have much deeper d-pockets.

“Ready,” was whispered. The sound couldn’t have gone far past the mask over her face, but Harrington nodded. She finished manually typing the message that she wanted the radio to transmit and gave a thumbs up.

Harrington opened the overhead hatch. A stasis field kept the water from pouring in and pinning them to the pod’s floor. Maybe that's how the dive suit functioned. With a stasis field? It had a tiny power supply, derived from kinetic energy and her own bio-electric field. Rekha shook off thoughts of physics and climbed the ladder. Despite the suit, she felt like she was climbing into cold honey.

Out of the lit safety of the pod, she felt the weight of the ocean pushing her down, crushing her with its merciless grip. Her eyes struggled to make out anything in the deep blackness. Only the strange floating bulbs and flitting creatures. Her breath stuttered.

Harrington grabbed Rekha’s mask, made her look at Harrington’s softly lit face. It grounded her. The claustrophobia receded, and Rekha’s lungs found a normal rhythm. Her pulse slowed. Harrington nodded. She maneuvered them until their flippered feet were against the top of the pod. She held up a hand, three fingers, then two, then one. Together, they launched upwards. As Harrington had instructed earlier, Rekha paddled with her feet and slowly reached overhead to curl her arms down.

The depth gauge on her HUD changed achingly slow. How long had they been swimming? She wished they’d had enough materials to build a seaglide or two. She was exhausted and they still had a hundred meters to go! It was pitch black now. No luminescent bulbs or fishes to break up the monotony of oppressive nothingness. Without her gauges, she’d have no idea if she was swimming up or sideways or absolutely nowhere.

And it was starting to get cold. She hadn’t noticed at first due to hot adrenaline and the suit’s insulation. She was far from freezing, yet it made her wish for a sweater and fuzzy slippers. Maybe a cup of hot c-

_ ROAR! _

Both women stopped dead. The roaring continued in terrifying spurts. Rekha felt a massive presence directly beneath them. Morbid curiosity had her touching its mind. It’d just found something new, something that gave off light and heat and might be food, so it was attacking.

Far below, she saw a flicker of light. Several breaths later, a flurry of bubbles raced upwards. Their life pod. The creature had  _ torn a hole in plasteel _ ! Harrington was already several meters in the lead before Rekha thought to frantically swim upwards. Angry roars spurred her on. A faint glow of light from above teased her.

The sun? Her chronometer said it was too early. Must be a moon. Wonder if…

_ ROAR! _

She barely registered the presence speeding toward her when enormous claws grabbed her. Bubbles screamed from her as the claws dug into the suit.

“Let me go!” she screamed, both into her mask and into the monster’s skull.

It shuddered and loosened its grip. Panic thrust her up, toward Harrington’s retreating form and the wavering disc of light.

The monster howled beneath her.

She kicked desperately, knowing she wouldn’t make it to the surface, let alone to some bastion of safety. Claws piercing her suit, then her skin, digging blindingly deep, made her shriek. Pain and terror seared along her nerves. She flailed wildly, bubbles everywhere, pain everywhere, wa-

A mind-numbing roar shut out the pain. She blinked into a double set of eyes illuminated a horrifying blue by her face mask, at the rows of hungry teeth beneath. The claws in her sides pulled her toward the open mouth.

No!

Absolutely, fucking  _ NO! _ Her entire core boiled into a single thought, “LET ME GO!” She threw it at the monster in a psychic scream.

It flinched, and the claws retreated. For a few seconds they stared at each other. Fury joined her maelstrom of emotions as the monster glared at her. How dare this thing try to eat her! How dare it try to end her life! It needed to hurt, like it had hurt her!

Another psionic blast lashed out, this one a combination of psychic  _ and  _ telekinetic force. It rippled through the water and crashed into the monster’s head like plasteel into stone. What was probably blood escaped the creature’s mouth. Over her pounding heart, she heard the monster whine. It blinked at her once more before coiling around and sluggishly swimming away.

Panting, she stared after it for long moments, ready to hurl another psionic attack. It didn’t circle back. It didn’t send out a predatory flare of thought.

Rekha decided that the creature was in full retreat and allowed herself to paddle to the surface. She gaped at what waited for her. Brilliantly red and orange, a gigantic moon dominated the night sky. Delicate clouds wafted across its face. Below them was a glowing monolith, shaped a little like a beetle. No. It was shaped like a…

A ship. The  _ Aurora _ . It had to be. Her heart plummeted from its adrenaline high. Shit. The ship wasn’t making a limping orbit around the planet like she’d hoped. It was nose-first in what must be a reef or shallows of a continent. Who knew when Alterra would bother sending another ship to investigate? Those assholes w-

Small and quick, a shadow darted across her vision. It veered to her right. Some sort of bird, and it disappeared into a bigger shadow. Rising from the waters, blacking out the field of stars, covered in luminescent plants, was land.

“Yes!” she cheered, slipped below the surface.

She kicked back up and splashed toward safety. It took a while to close the distance, then even longer to find a beach instead of sheer cliffs several meters high. Harrington was there, mask already pulled off, face a moonlit mix of exhaustion and terror. “Dogar? You’re alive.”

Rekha was too busy crawling up the sandy slope to respond. Pain made itself known. Pain around her torso and a splitting headache. She flopped to her butt and panted.

“You’re bleeding.” Harrington announced.

Was she? It hurt enough that she should be.

Instruments were already being pulled from a med kit. Harrington knelt and shone her PDA’s light over the injuries. Oh yea. There was blood. A lot of it. “Any trouble breathing?”

Was her lung punctured? That had happened once. A prawn suit had collapsed on her, broken several of her ribs, one of which had gone right into her left lung. Now  _ that _ had been painful. “No.”

“Good.” Harrington nodded. “Let’s get this gear off so I can patch you up.” Mask and tanks were tugged off, the suit unzipped to expose Rekha’s bare torso to the world. Harrington poked and prodded, made Rekha cry and whimper. “You’re lucky. These aren’t too deep.”

Lucky. Rekha eyed the smoldering hulk of the  _ Aurora  _ in the distance. Sure. Lucky to be alive. Stinging dermal spray was applied, stopping the bleeding, sealing the wounds, and starting the process of repair. Bandages covered most of her torso by the time Harrington finished.

“Warning!” One of their PDAs chirped.

Adrenaline spiked and Rekha scurried backward from the water. What? What was-

“Endorphin levels low. Consider taking a seat and meditating. It may help to remember that problems exist only where you choose to see them.”

Heartbeats pounded in her ears.

“When we get back, I’m going to write  _ several _ letters to upper management about this survival mode.” Harrington grumbled.

Rekha slumped and winced at the pain of movement.

“No painkillers in the med kit. Guess they don’t trust us to self-medicate. You should zip back into your suit. It might be warm and humid here, but with the exertion and blood loss, your body could use the support. You should also get something in your stomach.” Harrington advised. She pulled out a nutrient bar from storage and broke it in half. “I’m going to start rationing.” She glanced at their former ship. “Rescue might take a while.”

All good ideas. Painful though. Rekha wheezed as she struggled into the sleeves of her suit, then exchanged flippers for ship shoes, every motion feeling like fiery knives arcing through her chest. Storage mercifully wasn’t damaged. Food and water made it into her stomach. Her eyelids fluttered. She leaned against a rock and yawned.


	2. Curious Crabs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've obviously taken some liberties with the lore. There's so much possibility with the history of war between the trans-govs! I really hope there's more about it in Below Zero.

Girlish screaming woke Rekha.

“Get away from me!”

She jumped up to find Harrington using a water bottle to fend off a four-legged crab the size of a dog.

In a single motion, Rekha grabbed a leg and swung the thing against a rock. It snickered at her. She shrieked and threw it into the ocean. White hot pain lanced through her ribs. She gasped, falling to her knees, touching her sides. A hand came away bloody. What?

“Y-You,” Harrington stuttered, her expression wide and frightened. She panted. Her gaze went to Rekha’s bloody hand, and her features softened. “You reopened your injury. Sit still. Put pressure on it.”

Right. The monster from the deep that tried to eat her last night. Closing her eyes to hold back tears, she pressed down on the bleeding puncture, wishing for the painkillers that Alterra had decided weren’t necessary survival items.

“Wouldn’t it have been easier to deal with the crab like you did the leviathan?”

Her eyes shot open. The glare of the morning sun across the water made them flutter and squint.

“Or are you so used to hiding your psionic abilities that a physical response was your first reflex?”

Air rushed in and out of her mouth. She’d hoped Harrington had assumed Rekha was ultra lucky with her escape.

“Given that your psionic scream saved my life as well, I’m in no position to judge you, Dogar. I can’t say that I feel particularly friendly toward you. I lost a lot of friends in the Grass Moon War.” Harrington’s tone dropped its friendly effort, dipping cold and low.

Rekha couldn’t blame the older woman. Augmented Delhian soldiers had decimated the defending troops. She winced. What they hadn’t massacred, they’d twisted and broken to act as  _ examples _ of Delhian superiority. “You aren’t native Alterran either,” blurted out. She gasped and looked up.

Harrington’s lips were a thin line. “No. I’m Martian.”

The government of Mars had been so utterly stomped on that Alterra had absorbed it and more or less finished wiping out its unique culture. That war had also been one of the major reasons for the Charter.

“I’m sorry.” Rekha didn’t know what else to say. The Grass Moon War had ended when she was an infant. Yet it was why her people were universally hated throughout the galaxy.

“How did you hide your genetic revisions?”

Bribes. Judicious alterations of government records. Rekha ran a hand over her face. “I came to Alterra because I didn’t like the way things were done there. Look, I’ll find my own corner of this planet to wait for rescue on. I won’t bother you.”

Harrington watched as Rekha got up, starting climbing up the steep embankment. Rekha was puffing at the pain within moments. Her foot slipped on a loose stone, and she cried out as she started falling back. A strong hand caught her.

“I think it’s safer if we stick together, Dogar.” Harrington stated. “If you were my enemy, you would’ve gotten rid of me instead of letting me know your secret.” Confident, she met Rekha’s eye. “Right?”

“Yes.” Killing non-augmented people was easy. Though most sentients had a natural defense against psychic intrusion, few had training with it. Harrington might, given her age and origins. She may even have technological upgrades to it.

H-class psionics could breeze right past those defenses. Another reason that Rekha had left. Intruding on people's minds had always left her feeling dirty and unsettled. She wanted the sharing of thoughts to be a happy thing. She liked building and fixing things, not breaking them; hence her study of mechanical things and how to maintain them.

How to fix this problem? Her secret was out. Harrington would undoubtedly tell the authorities once they were rescued. Bribing officials would be expensive, far out of Rekha’s price range. Her best bet would be to run and hide at the first opportunity. With as little bloodshed as possible.

They cleared the barren hill and burst into a jungle. Some of the trees were odd, bulbous, blunt things that barely cleared three meters and produced a milky sap that smelled vaguely sweet. Too bad they hadn’t built a scanner before being evicted from their pod. Rekha would’ve liked to eat something other than chewy, offensively-lemony nutrient bars. There were traditional leafy trees, giant ferns, vines, grasses, fat purple cylinders, a dozen different flowers, and all manner of giant fungi. And of course, everything was luminescent, even in the daylight. At least one plant should be edible.

Unlike the ocean that teemed with animal life, the land boasted fish-like birds -birdfish?- and the giant crabs. That’s it. Not even insects. It was the most bizarre experience to walk through dense jungle and not get a faceful of spiderweb or hear something buzzing in the ears. Nothing. Just the wind playing with leaves and the pungent scent of green. Was this an island?

There definitely weren’t any humans nearby.

“Think anyone has discovered this?” Harrington wondered aloud.

Not anyone alive, was her reflexive thought.

Harrington glanced at her. She blinked, her face floating through a dozen emotions. “Can you,” she swallowed. “Can you hear anyone?”

“No.”

Despair pinched her features, giving them the lines that her age hadn’t. “At all?”

“No! I mean, yes! There are others.” Rekha gestured back the way they’d come. “But they’re out there. I don’t sense anyone up here at all.”

Harrington sighed. “Can you tell how many?”

Rekha looked at the sunlight filtering through the green. It was easier to talk about her sixth sense without looking at the Martian. “I…” She closed her eyes completely, reached out, felt for the unique brightness that was human life. There’d been 53 the first day. Many of them had been weak, probably suffered fatal wounds given that yesterday’s count was 35. A dozen were clustered in what she guessed was the  _ Aurora’s  _ location. Most of the weak ones had been there. All the others were in ones and twos, lifepods. She finished her count. “Twenty-nine.”

“So few,” puffed from the doctor. She reached a hand to a tree for support.

_ Aurora’s  _ original compliment had been 148 plus 9 passengers, the Mongolian emissary and his retinue. Less than a quarter were alive. Colleagues and friends they’d been sailing with for 13 months, even longer for Harrington, who’d been on  _ Aurora  _ for years, was aiming for the chief medical officer position. All those people gone. Their ship a smoldering lump of wreckage.

Rekha yawned. She needed a decent night’s sleep. Her wounds twinged. The beginnings of a headache pulsed. Painkillers would be good too. She found a nice patch of ground to sit on and yawned again.

“How far of a spread?” Harrington asked.

“Kilometers.”

“You’re H-class, aren’t you?” Hushed awe, underlain with tight fear questioned her.

Rekha stiffened. “Several classes of psionics can sense life across vast distances, doctor.”

“By the red gods, I felt the ripples of what you threw at that monster! Telekinesis is rare. Most can only lift a few kilos within a couple meters. Only a handful are strong enough to wield it as a weapon without the tech augments that the Charter forbids. Even fewer are also telepathic.”

Wow. Harrington was incredibly well informed. Telepathy and telekinesis were generally incompatible skills. That was the purpose of the H-57 breeding program: to create weapons capable of using both. Children bred as weapons. Rekha frowned. She was lucky to have been born while abroad. Her parents had chosen to raise her outside of Delhi territories. Fifteen years as a human being instead of a weapon. Rekha had been taught to harness her power like any good Delhian, yet had also had the chance to play and explore, to  _ live _ . Being forced into the military upon her parents’ recall…

Rekha had started looking for a way to leave by the first night of boot camp.

“My sister would never believe this. An H-class not two meters from me, and my brain isn’t leaking out my nose.”

“I’m a person, not a fucking weapon class!” barked out of her. Her lungs heaved with her sudden, righteous anger. “I’m a person!”

Huge eyes stared at her. Terror had the irises as thin rings.

Tears blurred her vision. She blinked them away and got up. “I apologize for my outburst,” hissed out of her. “I’m going to go explore.”

The sun was high overhead when she realized that Harrington was following several meters behind. Rekha stopped. Her body ached, her stomach grumbled about lunch, and her heart beat a dull throb of loneliness in her chest. She found a place to sit and pull out sustenance.

Slowly, Harrington approached. She sat down. “Thought we agreed that staying together was safer around here.”

A crab chose that moment to burst from the undergrowth, skittering toward Rekha. She batted it away with a thought. It crashed through the trees a dozen meters away. “Safer to stay with the biggest monster around?” was her angry sneer.

Harrington’s gaze drifted back from where it’d followed the crab’s airborne trajectory. Fear remained in them, yet it didn’t emanate from her like it had earlier. “I have to admit, I’m starting to see the bright side of hanging around a revised person.”

Rekha pursed her lips and turned her sight to the clouds starting to gather in the distance.

“You watch my back, I’ll watch yours.” Harrington said. “Otherwise these crabs will eat us in our sleep.”

They probably would.

“Good enough, Dogar?”

She met Harrington’s eye to say, “Good enough.”

Talk was abandoned.

 

Metal glinting in the late afternoon sun had one of them breaking the silence to point it out. Exhaustion and pain momentarily forgotten, they ran up the incline and crested the hill to find a habitat.

An old, heavily damaged habitat that was half buried under a landslide.

“Piss.”

Rekha did a quick mental sweep, in vague hope of her eyes’ deception, yet the surrounding area was as devoid of human life as before. She sighed. “Maybe it’ll still be good for shelter.” The clouds she’d been watching all day were now a black mass on the horizon. What looked like a nasty storm couldn’t be more than a few hours away.

“Maybe,” hummed from Harrington. She skittered down the collapsed hillside. Rocks and birdfish jumped away.

Crabs came to investigate. Rekha threw them at one of the two peaks that dominated the landscape. Now in the small valley between them, she could see glass and metal at the top of each. Likely as abandoned as this facility.

“This must be what Emissary Khasar came looking for.” Harrington said. “Has to be from the  _ Degasi  _ survivors.”

_ Degasi _ ? She remembered hearing about the Mongolians who’d crashed on some backwater planet a decade ago. It’d made the major news channels because the wealthy head of the Torgal clan and his heir were the ones who’d disappeared. Their skeletons were probably in this wreckage somewhere.

The original habitat design hadn’t been large, unless there was a maze hidden under the landslide. It had once been two levels. Two basic tubular units for the upper, one of which looked like it’d been ripped off and tossed aside. What was left of the main level was an ‘L’ of two units attached to circular general purpose room. Rocks and dirt filled what little they could see through the windows of the big room. The hatch was off the ‘L’, and four crabs came skittering when Harrington made a mountain of noise yanking on the rusted thing. They joined their brethren on an airborne journey.

Harrington managed to bully the hatch enough for the two of them to squeeze inside and investigate by the light of their PDAs. Two more crabs had to be dealt with. Rekha yawned at the effort. She chose to let Harrington test the ladder and investigate whatever was up there. She returned after wrestling the ladder’s hatch closed.

“Not much up there except shattered glass. Found a few ration bars in an old crate. They’re Mongolian and a decade old, but edible.” Two were offered to Rekha.

“Thanks.”

Harrington nodded. “Let’s see if we can get this hatch shut and finish blocking the corridor. We’ll have a safe place to grab some shuteye.”

They put on gloves to gather loose stones and wall up the corridor. As the shadows were starting to get long and the local foliage began to light up, they battled with rusted hinges. It was a losing battle. Rekha gave up first, her injuries screaming at the abuse. She walked around the base angrily until she nearly tripped over a half buried cargo box. A little digging had it revealing its jumbled contents.

Bottles and bottles of liquids, in various states of mostly empty. Bleach, hydrochloric acid, fertilizer -fertilizer? Had they started a farm? She peered into the growing dark, but shook her head. Tomorrow. What else was in here? Rolls of fiber mesh and rubber. More bottles of the same. Hand written label for lantern wine. Huh. It wasn’t sealed and smelled awful. Too bad. Wine didn’t last long unsealed. The last bottle was lubricant.

Hey, that could be useful.

“Harrington!” Bottle in hand, she made her way back to the hatch. “Maybe this will help.”

The label was squinted at. “Red gods, I hope so.” A brief struggle with the lid, and she splashed yellow slime on the hinges. She moved the door what little it would, splashed more. Same process on repeat for twenty minutes yielded excellent results. The hatch closed all the way and even locked in place.

The women shared relieved grins. Rolls of mesh and rubber were retrieved, then a small latrine pit was dug in the sand. Awful, yet better than doing her business over the open hatch of an escape pod. Thunder rumbled overhead. Rekha went to run inside. Harrington stayed, a thoughtful look on her face.

“Harrington.” Rekha grumbled as lightning flashed. “We should get inside.”  
“We don’t know when it’ll rain next.”

So?

“We should try to collect water while we can.”

“I’ve still got several liters.” Rekha argued, her eyeballs aching with the need for sleep.

“Dogar, in case you haven’t figured it out, we aren’t getting off this planet any time soon. Even if the  _ Aurora  _ can fly again, it’ll take weeks to repair the kind of damage that knocked it out of the sky to begin with. If it can’t, well, you remember how long it took us to get here from the last phasegate. And we both know we aren’t lucky enough for anyone else to be this far out from the shipping lanes.”

Months. If only they’d gotten that phasegate up  _ before _ they’d wandered past this terrible planet. More thunder growled, streaks of lightning quickly following. “Okay, doctor. What about that crate I pulled the lube from?”

They emptied the crate, finished pulling it from the ground, angled the open side straight up, and did the same with another crate they found. Wind whipped across the landscape, nearly shoving Rekha off her feet, scattering the bottles, and giving them a taste of what might have caused the terrible damage to the habitat. Thunder cracked. Lightning flashed.

Harrington decided to shove the crates up against boulders and weigh them down with stones at their bottoms. Rekha captured what bottles she could and tossed them into the habitat.

Rain began to pelt their faces.

They had to yell to be heard over the storm and hold onto each other to keep from being blown away. It became abruptly quiet when the hatch closed behind them. Rain pounded the habitat, yet the multiple layer construction of the walls kept it from being a deafening roar.

Rekha wiped sodden hair from her face, took off squishy shoes and collapsed to the floor. At least she’d been wearing her dive suit the entire time. If the jungle hadn’t been full of scratchy twigs and stabbing thorns, she would’ve switched into her ship uniform. The suit had been a nice protective barrier. Speaking of her suit, she pulled food and water from its storage. Harrington mentioning rations again had her stopping at half a bar. Her ravenous stomach objected, but it would be even unhappier getting nothing later.

“I think I saw some grow beds out there.” Harrington yawned. “We can investigate what’s growing in them tomorrow.”

The prospect of actual food instead of gritty bar made her mouth water.

Harrington unfurled a couple rolls of rubber and mesh, made something like an actual bed. Another roll served as a pillow. She stretched out and moaned. “That’s the stuff.”

Rekha was left to create her own. She thought to walk that extra two meters around the corner for a breath of privacy. Sheer exhaustion had her getting horizontal as quickly as possible. Gingerly, she laid on her back, right next to Harrington. The doctor opened an eye for a moment.

“Good dreams, Harrington.”

“You too, Dogar.”

She let her eyes fall.


	3. Pain and Death

Rekha woke from the oddest dream. She’d felt so old, so tired and immensely sad! It’d actually felt more like a telepathic sharing than a standard dream. That wasn’t possible. Firstly, the chance of another Delhian among the crew of the  _ Aurora  _ was miniscule. Secondly, another Delhian would have felt Rekha’s fight with the monster and contacted her by now.

“Stupid dreams.”

She made to rise in the darkness. Every muscle protested. Her injuries objected. A headache added to the urge to go back to sleep.

Her bladder argued otherwise.

“Dammit.”

“Morning to you too,” muttered from beside her. Harrington huffed. “Is it even morning?”

“Chrono says it’s 0530.” Planet time. Her PDA had switched from ship time once it had an accurate reading of the sky.

Harrington shifted and sat up, her shape a vague shadow in the darkness. “Suppose I might as well get up. Alarm would go off in an hour normally.”

Rekha opened her PDA for its soft glow and struggled to her knees. Sharp stabs of pain raced along her nerves. “Dammit.”

“Pain?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll check your injuries after we unload. Hopefully those crates are holding water. We can wash up.”

That sounded nice. She felt awfully crusty from the last few days. Had it only been three days since the crash? Wow.

Crabs waited on their proverbial doorstep. Rekha got rid of one with a groan. Her headache thundered. “Psi overload,” she hissed at Harrington’s questioning gaze. She hadn’t worked her mental muscles in months. Suddenly doing the equivalent of throwing a prawn exosuit at that monster was too much. 

A nod and Harrington found a tree branch to fend off the crustaceans with. They traded off while they unloaded their night’s waste. Rekha sighed at the complete lack of privacy. Her suit’s design forced her to be nearly naked to do her business. She couldn’t go alone without being attacked by hungry fauna. Life on the  _ Aurora  _ had been pretty lacking in privacy as well. Four beds to a room. Shared hygiene facilities. Full messhalls and lounge rooms.

And yet, private shower and toilet stalls. A bed to herself. Earplugs to listen to music or drown out a neighbor’s snores. Secrets kept to herself.

Old soldier that she was, Harrington immediately went to work. In the partial light of dawn, she found the crates full of water, used an empty bottle to make a cleaning solution with some bleach, scrubbed her hands, inspected Rekha’s injuries, scrubbed those.

It was fine until Harrington got to the one that had split open for the second, third time. Shit that burned!

“Salt water already did a good job flushing your injuries, which is why I wasn’t too worried about getting them clean yesterday. But with this one you keep aggravating...” She pulled out the mostly used med-kit, sprayed sealant on the injury. “Try not to do it again.”

“Yes, doctor.”

Bandages were applied. Sweaty dive suits were exchanged for ship uniforms. Both of their suits’ interiors got wiped down with bleach water and hung to dry. Taking stock of the area became the next priority. A couple more crates were unearthed, their contents investigated. Broken stasis rifle, depleted batteries, empty bottles, and a discarded PDA were found. Over lunch, they downloaded the PDA’s contents and browsed.

It contained logs from a  _ Degasi _ crewman until her apparent death and the young Bart Torgal acquired it, left a log describing how the crewman had struggled on despite her serious injuries, that she’d lived for three weeks longer than expected, that without her, they might not have found this island. A decent eulogy. Likely even better in its original language. The translation software provided by Alterra wasn’t the best. Surprise, surprise. Rekha purposely didn’t think about what Harrington might say for Rekha’s eulogy.

They took a few minutes to absorb the fact that they were on an island. Not a continent. A tiny liferaft on this ocean world. Damn. A rescue ship wouldn’t be able to land here!

Harrington put them back to work, though she made sure Rekha didn’t overdo and reopen her wounds  _ again _ . Grow beds were found. Several plants were growing in them, most unsurprisingly alien, except one plant that Harrington recognized.

“Chinese potatoes!” She crowed and poked in the dirt. “These things will grow practically anywhere. Oh, they’re actually good sized too. Just need to build ourselves a solar oven and we’ll be in business! I wonder if these things are melons? Red gods, I wish we had a proper scanner.”

Their PDAs had been spitting out mostly useless advice all day. Extremely minimal scanning capabilities made their comments annoying trivia. When they’d been connected to the life pod’s sensors, they’d been more useful. Harrington took their PDAs and threw them on their beds.

“Useless Alterran junk,” was muttered. The Mongolian PDA was equally useless given its outdated and depleted state. It too was tossed on the beds.

Solar panels were found, cleaned up, sighed at. Too damaged to do much. Might be enough for the oven. Another PDA was found, tossed aside to be looked at later. An incredibly odd artifact was lodged in the corner of the habitat. Some sort of metallic alloy. Lightweight. Fifty centimeters long, half as wide, two centimeters thick with a glowing violet design across it. Maybe it was art? The former inhabitants had been here long enough to need hobbies. It was tossed on the growing pile of things to be examined later.

More broken equipment, crushed cargo boxes, empty bottles, and crab attacks later, Rekha sat down for a break. She’d grown up in hot, humid environments. She’d trained in all manner of extremes. Yet, she’d been on the climate-controlled  _ Aurora _ for 13 months and on various similar stations for months before. And don’t forget that she was injured, on half rations, and at the edges of her stress limits.  _ And  _ that this planet was running on a 27.5 hour cycle that was 2.5 more than standard. She was suddenly aware that the planet’s gravity wasn’t more than she could handle. That would really tip the damn bucket.

Another crab showed up.

Harrington stabbed it with an impromptu spear made from a broken support bar. “I hope these things are edible.”

Earth crab meat was at the bottom of her preferred proteins. She couldn’t imagine this planet’s tasting any better. “Thought Martians didn’t eat living creatures.”

“Typically, no.” Harrington broke a crab leg open and sniffed the white flesh that spilled out. “Most of our protein was lab-grown, like standard Alterran practices now. Supply shortages during war made me review my moral outlook. Eat what I could get or not eat at all.”

Though she licked her lips, Harrington didn’t eat the meat. She shook the creature off her spear.

Rekha looked up at the sky. Clear. No gathering storm today.

“Hopefully one of these PDAs we keep finding will mention what they found to eat around here.”

Rekha nodded. “That’d be nice.” Her eyelids fluttered.

“Go take a nap, Dogar.” Harrington ordered.

Sleep was exactly what she wanted. But, “There’s work to do.” And she wasn’t about to let Harrington think she wasn’t willing to sweat as hard as the older woman.

“There is. But it’s better to let you rest and heal now while we aren’t desperate.”

Still didn’t feel right going for a nap while Harrington wasn’t.

“Go, Dogar. Your stubbornness is starting to get irritating.”

Her humor was teased enough to make her lips twitch. “Yes, doctor.”

Harrington’s expression softened. “Go.”

Rekha went inside and sealed the hatch. She fell asleep as soon as she closed her eyes.

An hour and a half was given to her before Harrington woke her to help unearth another cargo crate. This one was empty and damaged. It wasn’t water-tight. They decided to turn it into a table by filling it with rocks and closing the lid. Rekha ended up using it as a chair.

Night fell. Dinner was eaten. Quiet talk was made about what they would do tomorrow. They fell into beds around the corner from each other.

 

The next day went much the same. Harrington had them go through stretches before starting the hard work of salvage. A shattered PDA was found and tossed on the pile. Crabs were shooed away. They made plans to climb a peak the next day. Rekha managed not to aggravate her injuries. Much. Harrington still had her take a midday nap, joined her actually.

“I might be able to get your PDA out of emergency mode.” Rekha offered when the alarm went off.

Harrington blinked at her, not fully awake.

“Programming and hacking are part of a Delhian soldier’s basic education.” Not quite. Infiltration was taught to H-class, luckily for her; it’d help immensely in her bid to escape.

Harrington stiffened, stared, sucked her lip. She fished out her PDA from the pile and handed it over.

Rekha opened a small d-pocket she had embedded in her forearm, an act that made Harrington’s eyes bulge. D-pockets were extremely expensive to have installed in an organic host due to the difficulty in getting it to stabilize. Also very illegal in Alterra. The Delhian military had paid for hers, as standard for recon and infiltration specialists.

A custom PDA was pulled out. She brought up a few programs and sent their fingers into Harrington’s PDA. Root systems popped up. From there, it was simple enough to manually tick the requirements to shut off emergency mode. She decided that Harrington might need access to the mode’s more useful aspects, compiled a file, and left it as an icon on the home screen. 

Custom PDA was pushed back into hiding, and she gave the other back. “There you are. Access to your holo-novellas and emergency blueprints sans the unnecessary AI quips about Craig McGill.”

They finished the projects they’d started, had a quiet dinner and retired.

Morning came after another odd dream about being old and lonely. Rekha shook it off and joined Harrington on a slow hike to the northern peak. They found what amounted to a weathered trail that wound up in a spiral. It dumped them at a precariously placed habitat. The hatch was hanging by a single, ready-to-shatter hinge. A glass observation dome was cracked in several places, outright missing chunks on one side. Weeds and moss grew wildly inside. No crabs this high up. That was nice.

Inside was a cargo crate and a battered chair. Empty bottles, yet another PDA, and several batteries were found.

“All these batteries and nothing that needs them.” Harrington grumbled.

They managed to fit the crate into a d-pocket by transferring the contents of Rekha’s into Harrington’s. The chair wasn’t worth the trouble. Batteries and PDA were put into actual pockets. The view on the way down was admired for what it was, then dismissed for its depressing expanses of blue nothingness.

On the fourth day, they tackled the other peak. Noon found them at the final habitat. It was in even worse shape than the others. No hatch at all, no glass, no contents. With a habitat builder to break it down into base components, it would’ve been good as salvage at least.

“View could be worse, I suppose.” Rekha said as they looked out over the ocean, the downed  _ Aurora _ , the occasional white cap crashing into the shallow waters.

“Ma-”

“Emergency.” Harrington’s PDA announced. “A quantum detonation has occurred in the  _ Aurora’s  _ drive core. The reactor will reach a super-critical state in T-minus ten, nine, eight, seven…”

They stared at each for two seconds. As one, they dove behind the scarce safety of the rusted habitat.

“Four,” the PDA garbled out last three numbers.

The world hummed.

Then it exploded.

Rekha squeezed her eyes shut against the blinding light, clamped hands over her ears at the sonic blast that followed. She had to uncover them to grab at the habitat, hold tight against the hurricane force winds and tremors that rocked the island and tried to blast her off its peak. A kick of intense heat followed. What was left was a lingering crackle and a terrible stench in the air.

She reached out, feeling for the survivors that’d been on the ship. Three remained, all in horrible condition, one screaming out for his mother. He was alone, trapped in a corridor, pinned under something that he couldn’t move. He was terrified and in pain and Rekha tried to comfort him before she realized what she was doing.

_ Mommy, it hurts! _

She fell into his conscious mind, saw the I-beam pinning him to the bulkhead, that it was impossible to move, that it had actually severed his body in half, that his legs and hips and bowels were no longer attached to the rest of him.

_ Mommy! _

His death would be slow. Excruciating and wretched.

Rekha told him that he was okay, that everything was going to be fine.

His heart rate slowed, and he smiled.

She killed him.

Back in her own body, she hunched and heaved up her breakfast. Harrington tried to soothe her. She didn’t know, wouldn’t understand,  _ couldn’t _ know what it was like to be in someone’s head when they were dying, when she killed them.

Rekha screamed.

She screamed and she cried, and she wished she’d not been born psionic, that she’d never had to deal with death and pain in the measure she had. She bawled like a child. Snot and tears covered her face, made her headache worse, made her cry harder. Harrington stopped trying to soothe her and embraced her instead.

Birdfish landing on the habitat and chirping roused her from her tears. They let themselves be dried in the stiff winds. She sniffled. Her headache growled.

“Want to talk about it?” came Harrington’s soft offer.

Rekha sat back. Harrington’s old-fashioned hairstyle was in disarray. Frizz ringed her skull, grey and brown strands escaping the meticulous braid that usually sat on her left collarbone. Rekha’s own hair was cut in the popular style. Clipped close to the skull from base to temples, all the way around, with a mass down the center that was typically fluffed up and forward. It was a flat mess now.

“Almost all the ones who were on the  _ Aurora _ , they’re dead. I gave one of them a more merciful end than he was headed for,” came out dull and monotone.

The Martian stared at her. She looked at the burning hulk. Almost half of the  _ Aurora  _ was simply gone. The explosion had ejected the entire front half of the ship; all that remained were skeletal beams. Emotions warred on her face until she faced Rekha again. They seemed to have settled on tired. “In the war, there were always patients whose lives I couldn’t save. But,” she ran hand over her hair. “But I could save them from pain and give them quick ends.”

Rekha shuddered.

“Let’s get back down while we have light.”

Rekha did her best to avoid looking at the smoking wreck that taunted her with burning nightmares. She wasn’t very successful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've read a few fics that have the dive suits being advanced nano-tech. I considered it, but it didn't feel like there'd be use for a welder if Alterra had super smart, self-repairing dive suits and stuff. That would imply that vehicles and habitats would be self-repairing too. Unless cost was a factor? As far as game mechanics go, I get why you can swim around basically unscathed in the lava zones until you run out of air, but contextually it doesn't make sense. Why have a prawn suit then except for mining? I really don't like the things. In essence, no nano-tech in this fic. Probably.
> 
> Please leave a comment!


	4. Tentacle Trouble

Another stormy evening saw them downloading the contents of the thrashed PDAs. Turned out that survival mode could briefly power and hack other PDAs. Rather shady, but Rekha was going to remember that handy trick.

One of the PDAs offered logs from a crewman reminiscing about food from home. Rekha could sympathize. Mongolians knew how to cook. Their ships didn’t serve nutrient bars as a staple meal. They grew complex gardens aboard ship, had meals full of fresh vegetables, chock full of flavor and nutrition. Rekha would dance for some good food right about now. Her mouth watered, and her stomach grumbled.

Thankfully, the PDA’s owner compared home cooking with what they could eat on this planet. Sweet, but dull melons. Chewy lantern fruit. The chalky white sap of the bulbo tree. Tiny leaves of the short ferns. Crabs. Most fish. 

No spices. Except salt. There was always salt. Salt everywhere! Just like the damn water.

Someone in the background yelled at them to shut up. The owner swore under their breath and stopped the recording. Other logs were mostly about day to day life onboard ship. Then complaining about the crash. And a few bemoaning a terrible flu that had come on suddenly. Nothing else after the voice had a terrible coughing fit that sounded wet and painful.

Another PDA only had a couple not-corrupted files. Personal logs from Bart Torgal, the young heir. He talked about a theory he had on teeth and enameled glass, that one of the dangerous predators living in a kelp forest had teeth heavy with metal oxides used in enamelling. Someone named Marguerit believed his theories and harvested some, allowing him to test and prove his idea. He made a side note that the predator might be domesticable, like Earth wolves.

“What good is enamelled glass here?” Harrington muttered, reaching for her PDA.

“Prawns.” Rekha supplied.

“What?”

“The prawn exosuits. Regular glass wouldn’t stand up to the rigors of mining or anything other than shallow exploration.” She explained. “Like ordinary steel is inferior to plasteel. Plasteel and modern enamelling techniques are what make the prawn suits so damn versatile.”

Harrington had her emergency blueprints up. “Why doesn’t the seamoth use enamelled glass?”

“Why take a moth to a depth that would kill you?” Rekha shrugged. “These reinforced dive suits aren’t suitable past one point five kilometers. The oceans on most planets go much deeper. Down there, moths would only be good for pure exploration. You can’t collect materials, can’t fish or mine, which a survivor needs to do. The seamoth design could be reconfigured to go beyond what the upgrade modules offered, but it would take time and significant resources. They’d be better spent building a larger submarine that can carry the prawn and double as a moving habitat.”

The crewman’s PDA was mostly corrupted as well. Which was fine. Most of the memory was filled with holo vids with names like  _ Tentacle Trouble _ .

“At least we don’t have to use trial and error to find edibles.” Harrington tossed the PDA with the offensive holo vids into the corner. “I wasn’t looking forward to ingesting possibly toxic plants.”

In the morning, they sampled the melons. Not bad. Not good. Mostly tasteless. At lunch, the aptly named lantern fruit. It was like a giant, chewy grape. No wonder someone had made wine out of it. Dinner was leaves and crab cooked over a small fire. Harrington seemed to enjoy it. Rekha was not a fan, mostly of the texture, the meat’s flavor was surprisingly pleasant. She spent the rest of her evening tinkering with ideas of how to make an oven out of salvage.

 

Island life continued on much the same. A lot of hard work mucking through wreckage and scouring the island for anything useful. Mornings offered Rekha some blissful time to herself. Most saw her on sitting on the northeastern cliffs, watching the sun rise behind the  _ Aurora _ . It was the only time of day where she could see the shadow of what must be another island. A pair of survivors attempted to head for it on day six. Terror radiated from them mid-morning and a few minutes later, both were dead.

Every day killed another survivor or two or four. The planet’s locals either thought humans were the tastiest snack in the galaxy or were just that aggressively violent. Or both. Or maybe they were dying from infected injuries and dumb mistakes. Rekha couldn’t be sure. She tried to help once, when two pairs were so close to each other.

She tried to guide them, but one of the crew was so terrified that he refused to listen, got so distracted that he didn’t see the hungry predator swimming up on him. His partner wasn’t any better. They thought they were hallucinating and actively ignored her. The third listened, but their partner screamed about Delhian monsters and took a knife to them both. Pain and terror exploded in the connection. Rekha didn’t try to help anyone else.

By the end of the third week, there was only one other survivor besides Rekha and Harrington. 

“Harder to kill than a flea.” Harrington joked.

The nickname stuck.

Rekha tracked the flea. Harrington would ask about them. They would hope together that the flea survived another day.

 

Sometimes, she imagined that she could see the lone industrious survivor out there, doing whatever they were doing to survive. They moved about a lot. She wondered what they were doing, if they’d heard anything on the radio. What was Alterra’s ETA? Were they even bothering to send someone?

Had the flea dug in? Built a habitat? Found ways to avoid the giant predator that their PDAs named a reaper? Fixed the radiation leaks from the drive core that the PDA had stopped whining about? Discovered the caves that Bart Torgal had talked about moving to? Found inks to paint the terribly dull grey walls of the habitat?

Rekha wondered as she stared at the vast expanse of water without actually reaching out. Birdfish squawked around, occasionally dipping below the surface or alighting on some reef that poked up into the air. Footsteps were coming up the path. Did Harrington need something?

“Anything new today?” Harrington yawned.

Rekha shrugged. “No.”

Her gaze was upward.

Rekha followed it, didn’t see anything. “See something?”

Harrington bit her lip. “I thought…”

She waited.

“I thought I saw a ship up there,” was nearly whispered to low for Rekha. “I was picking some fruit and saw a flash of something. So, I…” Her voice trembled to a halt.

Hope briefly fluttered in her chest. She scoured the thin clouds above for any sign of what Harrington might have seen. Nothing.

Harrington sighed and sat down. They watched the sun’s lazy climb for a while before Harrington spoke again. “What’s the flea up to today?”

“I haven’t checked yet.”

“Ah.”

She started to reach out, but a distinct flash in the sky caught her attention. A ship? She reached up there instead. Human minds were there. “A ship!”

They both scrambled to their feet, cheering and jumping.

“Yes!”

It was aiming for that other island. Rekha reached out, felt the flea waiting there. They were broadcasting excitement. Pure excited hope. It seemed familiar, yet Rekha wasn’t willing to intrude enough to discover their identity. The reactions of her former crewmates remained fresh in her mind. She jumped at Harrington’s hand clutching at her arm.

“The flea?”

“Yea. “ Rekha gasped. “They’re there. Waiting.” They must have a radio.

Together, they waited in silent anticipation of the ship’s arrival. The ship’s sensors would have picked them up as well as the flea. Logistics of getting to them might be tricky, but th-

An intensely green light shot up from the island. Terror spiked from the ship’s crew, and a moment later, a fireball exploded. Smoke billowed. Dark shapes spilled in every direction. The ship was gone. Hope was gone.

Planetary defense systems? But… who? Why? And how did they come up with such powerful weaponry? A single blast that could utterly eradicate a starship, even a small one like that?

Rekha puddled to her knees. “We’re never getting off this planet.”

“Get up.”

She frowed up at harrington. “Why?”

“We have chores to do.”

Was she joking? “What the hell is the point?”

Harrington grabbed at her shirt and yanked until Rekha was on her feet. “We need to find a way off this island, disable that weapon, and survive until the next ship comes.” Ferocious determination glared at her. “I didn’t survive the Grass Moon War to die on this shithole of a planet. And you didn’t escape Delhi to die here either.”

Rekha didn’t have the energy to argue.

 

They found the remains of a fabricator. Most of its components were absolutely worthless. Harrington set Rekha the impossible task of fixing it. Harrington soldiered forward. She kept them focused, busy, alive. They built an oven out of plasteel and powered it with a partially repaired solar panel. It cooked crab a lot better than their terrible campfires that sputtered awful smelling smoke. Nothing on the island seemed to burn well.

The old soldier was a font of determination and ideas to survive that Rekha boggled at. Without her, Rekha probably would have offed herself that day they watched the ship get shot down. It amazed her that the flea continued on as well. Who could have that much dogged determination all by themselves?

What little downtime Harrington allowed, Rekha filled it with wondering who the flea was. The captain? CTO Yu? Hessah? That annoying exo-head who always managed to damage his prawn on the simplest of EVAs? Venjie? Rekha’s heart fluttered at the last. She’d developed a serious crush on that woman over the past few months. She was one of the few women who preened at Rekha’s flirting yet easily shot her down.

Engineer Venjie Remus. Aside from being physically attractive, Venjie had an incredible array of amazing qualities. Intelligent, fiercely so. Resourceful, caring, easy to talk to. She had a wonderful laugh. It could be sweet or raucously loud, depending on the situation, yet always catching. Rekha could never hold a serious face when Venjie started laughing.

If the  _ Aurora _ hadn’t been so small, Rekha would have found a way to avoid Venjie. She’d been planning on finding another commission when the phasegate was finished. Her crush had been starting to get rather serious. Frankly, she was glad that Venjie had turned her down at first. It made the boundaries of platonic friendship easier. Rekha would flirt outrageously just to make sure Venjie turned her down. Serious relationships didn’t work for Rekha. She had too many secrets that Alterrans wouldn’t like. She made do with simple trysts with women who didn’t want anything else.

The remembered hurt made her frown. She turned her mind to something else. She really missed having a proper hygiene facility. And the accompanying toiletries. At least she’d had her annual health checkup recently and gotten her reproductive and menses control shot. Harrington was old enough not to have them at all. Rekha couldn’t imagine being marooned with an active menses cycle. All that mess and smell. Her current soapless situation was bad enough. How had ancient Earth females done it?

 

Another angry storm whipped into them. They treated it like the others, finished their chores, went to bed, fell asleep. Except, it was still there in the morning. It kept roaring all day. Through the one intact window, they watched the storm uproot trees and wreck everything in sight.

The murderous intent of the storm made Rekha whimper. Was the habitat rocking? Fear pulsed in her. If the habitat broke apart now…

But the habitat wasn’t creaking or groaning like it was losing its foundation.

“Is the  _ island  _ rocking?” she whispered.

Harrington held her hand. “I think it might be.”

They both ended up vomiting from motion sickness at least once. Rekha twice. The little crate that they kept inside for emergency unloading was filling up awfully fast. Rekha thanked any gods that were listening that the lid held tight and didn’t let the contents slosh. She thanked them again when the storm finally let up after three days.

Storm.

Fucking hurricane.

“We really need to get off this island.” Harrington muttered as they looked out from the island toward the  _ Aurora. _ The wreck didn’t seem to have been affected, except that maybe it smoldered a little less. And it was closer.

“Are we closer? Did the island move?”

Harrington grumbled under her breath for a few moments. She suddenly threw up hands. “Rekha, how’s the flea?”

Panicked, she swung wide, didn’t sense anything at first, not until she reached deeper. A huff of relief came out. “Alive.” They must have built a habitat at a safe depth, where the waves wouldn’t be a problem.

“Maybe you should call to them.” Harrington sighed.

“And have them think they’re going mad when they start hearing voices? Or worse, get them eaten by monsters after surviving that hurricane?” Rekha argued. “No.”

“You said they move awfully fast. They could have a seamoth. Don’t those come equipped with defenses?”

“Not the standard unit. An upgrade module’s required. The flea might not have access to everything, remember? If their PDA was damaged, they may very well be stuck scanning wreckage for blueprints.”

Harrington rubbed her hands together. “Maybe we should open up communication and see if we can help?”

Rekha stared silently.

Harrington met her eye. “It’s a risk. They might not believe the voice suddenly in their head, I know. I’ll leave it as your call, Dogar.”

They lapsed into their usual quiet as they returned to their valley and its chores. For Rekha, it was full of bubbling agitation. Harrington had suggested that Rekha use her psionic ability. Sure, she suggested uses for her psionics all the time: get rid of this crab, toss me that bottle, hold that up there, call me if anything happens. The old soldier barely even flinched at floating objects anymore. She’d gotten used to Rekha. She didn’t seem afraid anymore. And that was  _ huge _ .

That the Martian was voluntarily saying she was not only okay with, but would respond to, a telepathic call in an emergency situation was ultra mind-blowing. That she was willing to suggest Rekha call out to someone else was  _ bigger _ . Harrington had come to trust an augmented person. Trusted her to respect privacy, to wait for consent, to not violate the trust given.

All that was fantastic! So why did Rekha feel agitated now? Why did she feel the need to say something more? Was it to thank Harrington? Yes, but no.

“Hey, Dogar.” Harrington waved a hand. “Hand me the knife.”

Dogar. That was it. “Dogar isn’t my name.” Dogar was Turk. A good neutral affiliation to match her cinnamon features and black hair, one that wouldn’t raise eyebrows. Her family name was Sharma. Nothing special about her name aside from producing a few H-class, yet it was distinctly Delhian. Keeping her given name had been a risk, but she hadn’t been willing to give it up, and it blended with the Turk name well enough. 

“No?”

“I took it on when I got my Alterran citizenship. Just call me Rekha.”

Harrington studied her. “Changed the family name but not your given?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, Rekha. Will you hand me the knife now?”

She smiled and used her psi to grab the tool and deliver it with a flourish.

“Showoff.”

As they laid down for sleep that night, Harrington spoke quietly. “May as well call me Alandris. We aren’t on the ship anymore.”

Rekha smiled into the darkness.

“Just don’t start flirting with me like you did everyone else. My sexual preferences don’t include females.”

Chuckling, “Sure. Though since we already spent so much time naked together, it’d only make sense that w-”

Nails pinching the delicate skin of her thigh had her squeaking.

“Go to sleep, you insufferable little girl.”

Rekha laughed, got Harrington -no-  _ Alandris _ laughing as well. She was sure she smiled into sleep. She definitely went out thinking about how that was the first time they’d laughed since crashing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can you imagine? A hurricane whips up and just pushes that floating island wherever it wants. That island could have been anywhere when the Degasi first crashed! It actually bothered me in game that it never moved.


	5. The Flea

_ They’re here, Alandris! _

_ Rekha? You’re… you’re in my head. _

_ Yes. They’re here! _

_ What? _

_ The flea! The other survivor! I was up at a peak hab, checking for good wiring when I saw movement on the beach. There’s a seamoth down there! I’m heading there now. _

_ Did you recognize them? _

Rekha was glad she wasn’t having to speak aloud. She was already panting hard from the dead sprint she’d launched into.  _ No. Too far. _

_ I’ll meet you there. _

Rekha returned her attention to the steep path winding down from the peak. It was a struggle. She wanted to keep tabs on the flea, but she also needed to not slip and fall to a squishy death. Who had thought a mountainous peak was a good place for a habitat? Stupid Mongols.

Somehow, she made it safely off the treacherous path with only one close call. Stupid loose rocks trying to kill her. She searched for the flea. Okay, that direction. She left the path and dove into the jungle. Plants slapped her in the face, probably left cuts and welts at her breakneck passage. A scream assaulted Rekha when she burst through the thick foliage in front of the flea. She backpedaled. “Sorry!” Breath heaved out of her, and she had to bend over to not fall down. “I ran,” pant, “Here.” Pant. “Saw you land.”

“By the Charter!” the flea shrieked. “Are you real?”

Rekha caught her breath and looked up. Venjie Remus was staring at her. “I um, I’m real.”

“Rekha Dogar,” was said slowly, reverently.

The staring kept up, Rekha rooted in place, limbs frozen. Of all the people to survive, it was Venjie. Her heart found the energy to rush madly again.

Abruptly, Venjie’s hands were touching her face, her shoulders, her arms. “I’m not hallucinating!” gushed out. 

“Ye-yea.” Rekha was enveloped in a crushing hug. “Oof.”

Breath whispered across her neck. “I’m not alone.”

Not anymore. Rekha hugged her back.

“Rekha?” called through the jungle.

Venjie jerked. “There’s someone else? More survivors?”

“That’s Alandris.” At Venjie’s blank look, “Dr. Harrington. We were in the same pod.” She sucked in a breath. “There’s no one else.”

“Where are you?” shouted again.

“Here!” Rekha returned. 

Noisy crashing through the plants preceded Alandris’ grumpy face. Her expression shifted to delight on seeing Venjie. “Gods.”

“Dr. Harrington!” coughed from Venjie, though her body jerked toward the new arrival, she seemed reluctant to let go of Rekha.

“Remus, right?” Alandris asked. “Drive core engineer?”

“Yes, doctor. Venjie Remus.”

Alandris smoothed her hair back and laughed. “No need for formalities around here. It’s Alandris.” 

“Alandris,” she whispered. A second later, she burst into tears. “Gods, I’m sorry. I just… People.”

Rekha did her best to soothe Venjie, patting her back, telling her she understood, that it was okay. Alandris stepped close to set a hand on Venjie’s shoulder. Venjie’s arm darted out to grab the older woman and pull her into the embrace. Similar soothing murmurs came from Alandris. They stood there until curious crabs appeared.

One of them went flying before Rekha stopped herself. No need to frighten Venjie with psi. Alandris used her ever-present spear to stab another. “Hungry, Venjie? These things aren’t bad.”

A laugh coughed out. “I suppose it is lunch time.”

In a tight knot, the three of them hiked to the valley, where Venjie gasped about the habitat and its history.

Rekha prepped the crab for cooking while Alandris harvested some fruit for an amazed Venjie. “Fresh fruit?” She dug in with gusto, juices dribbling down her chin. Cute and terribly sad at the same time.

Their last melon was cut up. Alandris carefully set aside the seeds for when they finally had power for an interior growbed. The hurricane had finished destroying the exterior ones and most of their contents. Venjie gasped over the melon’s sweet, tender flesh and nearly cried at the fresh greens that Rekha cooked the crab with.

Alandris told the abbreviated tale of how she and Rekha had survived. Pod’s flotation device failed, they decided to swim up, barely avoided the giant leviathan swimming around. They found the valley, had been stuck here since. Appreciation filled Rekha. Alandris was keeping her secret.

Venjie wiped her mouth and cleared her throat. “I landed in what I’ve come to think of as the shallows. No big predators. Lots of little fish and materials I needed to build basic tools to repair my pod. I probably would’ve stayed in it for a while, but these storms…”

Rekha and Alandris nodded in understanding. A storm that could shake an island would’ve decimated a lifepod.

“My pod was in really bad shape for a while.” Venjie explained. Her tone lacked the raw horror that Rekha’s would’ve been layered with had she been speaking. “Radio, medcabinet, fabricator, all down. Only two days worth of food and water, no equipment or raw materials to build with. I count myself lucky that my parents were geologists for a mining group. They taught me a lot about identifying rocks and minerals when I was little.”

Had she ever once doubted her ability to survive?

“I never would have made it this far if I couldn’t find copper without a scanner in my hand. Even after I built one, I can’t imagine having to scan every meter of stone looking for resources. It’s bad enough I’ve had to scan nearly every fish and plant I’ve come across.

I first built a little base in one of the kelp forests, but the light-forsaken sharks kept attacking. Stupid things are attracted to metal. I’ve watched them fight over scraps of hull, should’ve occured to me.” Venjie groused. “I moved it briefly to a fairly shallow area with lots of red kelp and annoying ambush predators until I could upgrade my air tanks. Now, I’ve got a nice setup in the mushroom forest. Few predators. Wish the ghost ray songs weren’t so creepy, but I’ll take it. There’s plenty of materials to recycle from a nearby chunk of wreckage.”

Rekha was enthralled. She’d always known Venjie to be capable and resourceful, but her story was incredible! No fear at all. Only her usual optimism that she could handle anything thrown her way.

“How did you build a scanner if your fabricator was down?” Alandris asked.

“Oh. I cannibalized the other broken equipment until I managed to get it running long enough to fab a welder.” Venjie wiggled her fingers. “I really hope that the welder’s inventor is living a comfortable life. They deserve it. That is the single most useful tool in the galaxy.”

It really was. The tool could mend ripped rubber, plasteel, wiring, basically anything except organic material. If you had the blueprints of the equipment, it could fix really complicated apparatus, like computer chips. Hours of time were saved using the welder instead of having to replace ruptured hulls, frayed wiring, cracked prawn casings…

“I think you’re just as lucky to have mechanical expertise as having geology training.” Alandris hummed.

Rekha nodded. “Luckier to have landed in the shallows. That leviathan we saw,” she flinched at the reminder. “It’s huge.”

“I saw your pod down there.” Venjie said quietly, an ounce of fear in her words, though mostly sad. “It looks like most of the others I’ve come across. Massive hole in it, like big claws ripped the plasteel open.”

She touched the mostly healed gouges on her ribs. Remembered pain and terror seared across her torso, through her veins, made her bite her lip to keep it inside.

“It has enormous mandibles.” Alandris’ tone was hushed with dread.

Venjie nodded. “I’ve seen it. Meters long, big enough to eat a person in a bite or two. Scanner called it a reaper.”

Reaper. Apt name.

“Did you hear it? That roar it makes? It’s echolocation.” Venjie said.

Rekha balked “You can’t be serious. It’s not to inspire terror in its prey?”

Venjie shook her head. “That’s only a bonus for it.”

Wind rattled leaves. Rekha looked for angry clouds, was glad not to see any this evening.

“I’ve been on autopilot for so long,” whispered Venjie. “Surviving. Hoping to find others.” She looked distinctly uncomfortable. “After the  _ Sunbeam _ ...” She shook her head.

“The  _ Sunbeam _ ?” Rekha prompted after several moments.

She frowned. “Did you see the ship that tried to come down?”

“Oh.” Rekha sighed. Alandris’ lips became a thin line. “We did.”

“It was the  _ Sunbeam. _ There’s something on the island over there, a weapon.”

“Planetary defense to be that powerful.” Rekha supplied.

Venjie frowned deeper. “Yes. It shot down our rescue. It probably shot down the  _ Aurora _ and the  _ Degasi _ . The scanner couldn’t identify the materials that it was built with. I couldn’t get in to investigate. There are forcefields, powerful ones, blocking the entrances.”

Another gust of wind parted the leaves, let scalding sunlight flicker across Rekha’s neck and shoulders.

“Did you notice that this island is floating?” Venjie suddenly brightened.

“Floating?”

She laughed. “Yes!” Her arms went wide. “These giant organisms are attached to the base of it, they’re full of air sacs that make them and whatever they’re stuck to float. This whole island is floating!”

Rekha and Alandris looked at each other. “That explains a lot.”

“What?”

Alandris brushed at her frizzy hair. “We thought it was our imagination, but that hurricane moved us closer to the  _ Aurora _ . We both struggled with motion sickness from the rocking.”

“I need off this planet.” Rekha muttered.

Venjie sighed agreement.

“We should probably start by getting off this island.” Alandris said. “Get to Venjie’s habitat, if you don’t mind guests for a while.”

“That’d be great!” She smiled. “But the seamoth only seats one.”

“And I’m not keen on swimming out in the open.” Rekha’s imagination conjured up how quickly that leviathan, that  _ reaper _ would try to eat her again.

A noise of disgust came from Alandris. “Oh think outside the box, children!”

Rekha glared at her. “Yes, mom. Venjie, do you have the materials to build a couple more moths?”

She shook her head. “No. But, I could rig a tow. We can use wire cables or kelp strands. Those things are amazingly tough. I think we’re outside of, or at least on the edge, of the local reaper’s territory. They’re more active at night. If we go during the day, we should be fine.”

“Better.” Alandris praised.

Venjie nodded. “You said you came up from the deep, what kind of equipment do you have?”

They went into detail about the quality of their gear, that the gauges said the tanks had refilled by themselves. Alandris mentioned that both their suits needed repairs. The island had been rough on them.

Venjie produced her welder and went to work making the suits usable for diving again. Plans were made for Venjie to return to her base the next day, to take a load of supplies from the island and collect means for a tow. In the meantime, the habitat on the island would be renovated.

They finally put their stockpile of old batteries to use. Venjie’s habitat builder disassembled the broken chunks of habitat into their base components, then they shrugged and had her take down everything. From the surplus, a large multipurpose room was built. No holes. One functional window. A few lockers. A bed. An actual bed instead of rolls of rubber and mesh, even blankets, oddly textured, yet comforting. It was big enough that all three sharing it for a night wouldn’t be terrible.

Four batteries later, there was a functioning fabricator and solar panels to power it  _ and  _  the luxurious temperature controls. A battery charger was built and filled with the depleted cells.

“Are we going to leave this here when you come down?” Venjie asked.

Alandris smoothed her hair. “I expect we’ll be making regular trips here for a while. Access to the abundance of fresh water and greenery is important, not to mention the good a little fresh air and sunlight can do.”

Rekha chose not to mention how little she liked the idea of going meters below the surface, to a world where sunlight was a vague notion, and how quickly a habitat could become a cramped, dark tomb. She swallowed a shudder.

From the crates, they pulled supplies and began organizing them in the shiny new lockers.

“What is this,” chirped from Venjie. She was pointing at the odd Mongolian art.

“Don’t know.” Alandris hummed. “Found it here.”

“It’s the same as…” Her expression was somewhere between fear and anger.  “I saw a similar symbol at the other island. I think it might be a key.”

“A key?”

“To the alien weapon.” Venjie waved in its general direction. “There’s what seems like a terminal directly outside the forcefield. I bet this thing is an access key.”

Made more sense than it being art, she supposed.

Venjie asked to take it, received no argument, and the tablet was put in Venjie’s d-pocket. 

Dinner was a celebration. They shared nostalgic stories, told jokes, and enjoyed the presence of hope. Sunset was a miraculous glow in Venjie’s amber eyes. All that hope and beauty made Rekha’s blood race. She had to turn away and swallow the want that surged in her chest. Just because Venjie was stuck on this planet too didn’t mean a relationship had any more possibility of blooming here than on the  _ Aurora _ .

Stupid heart. Why did it want more than good sex?

Darkness took over the island despite the plant life’s glowing attempts otherwise. Rekha allowed her eyelids to droop and her senses to dull. She was ready to be the first one in bed, to be asleep before Venjie got in and made Rekha’s senses buzz. A yawn stretched her jaw. “Don’t know about you two, but I’m exhausted.”

Venjie looked shocked. “It’s early yet.”

Not surprised, Alandris waved.

“Good dreams.” Rekha yawned as she moved away.

“Oh.” Venjie’s voice followed. “Good night!”

She wasn’t asleep by the time her companions decided to call it a night. Having Alandris take the other edge meant that Venjie was crammed between, her soft frame pressing along Rekha’s. She was certain that Venjie could hear her heart hammering at her ribs. She must. Wh-

“No.” Alandris grunted. 

“There’s not as much space as I thought there’d be.” Venjie hissed.

“Even if I wanted to cuddle, this bed is too warm for it. Spoon Rekha.”

“She’s asleep.” Venjie whispered. “I’m not going to impose on her like that.”

Any other situation Rekha would have already rolled over. Her hands would be grazing along Venjie’s thighs while her teeth nibbled on her ear. Hot breath on an exposed neck. Soft words whispered. It’d be an enjoyably long night.

Rekha wanted to run.

She also wanted to see what being held by Venjie was like. She was tired of being lonely.

Time to get up. She forced out a stretch and yawned loudly. “This thing is too soft,” was muttered. She pretended to be surprised by the extras in bed. “I actually slept?”

Suspicion crooked Alandris’ brow. “A couple hours.”

“Oh.” Rekha yawned, a real one this time. “Maybe I'll catch a few more on the floor.” She avoided Venjie's eye and put feet to cool floor. Spare mats were retrieved and laid out. Her skin prickled from the habitat's cool air, made her regret exiting the bed's warmth, made the lack of pillow more prevalent. She stifled a groan. No way was she getting more sleep tonight.

“You're right, doctor.” Venjie suddenly spoke. “The bed is too warm.” 

Feet slapped on the floor, crossed to Rekha, made her open her eyes. “But the floor is freezing.” Venjie crouched, held out the blanket. “Want it?”

She managed to hesitate only because Venjie's care tangled her thoughts. “Yes.”

Warm blanket was arranged from feet to shoulders, then a pillow was presented and gratefully accepted. “Good night,” was smiled at her.

Fantasies of a domestic life flitted through Rekha's skull for what felt like half the night. When she finally got to sleep, she dreamt of Venjie's smile. Waking up to reality was a disappointment. Luckily, she woke first and had time to let the sunrise clear her mind and school her expression. She returned as Alandris was finishing breakfast prep. A serving was handed her on a piece of scrap they used as plates.

“We'll have fish and kelp salad tomorrow.” Venjie promised after a few bites. “I've figured out which taste the least awful,” was giggled.

“How appetizing.” Alandris deadpanned.

Easy laughter warmed the room, challenged Rekha’s fresh control on her emotions.

“Raw kelp isn’t bad, but I wish I’d had your oven. The fabricator does  _ not _ offer appetizing creations.” Venjie made a gagging motion.

Inspiration hit Rekha. “I could probably rig together a stovetop.” She brought up her PDA, swiped through the copy of the  _ Aurora’s  _ blueprints in it, focused on the galley. “Yea. I can put this together.”

Alandris was peeking over her shoulder. “Can’t you send this to the hab builder?”

“Not easily. This isn’t an authorized copy. It’ll be much faster to manipulate what it already has.”

“Your PDA’s unlocked?” Venjie gaped.

Dammit. She didn’t have a story ready. Wh-

“Rekha has a knack for technology.” Alandris supplied. “Hadn’t you noticed?”

Venjie snorted. “It’s always about how good she is with her hands, isn’t it?”

She jumped on the topic change. “And my mouth.”

Venjie rolled her eyes. “A regular prodigy. Which reminds me, Dogar. My answer is still no.”

No. She wouldn’t have casual sex with Rekha. A pout was summoned. “But sex is good for the soul, Venjie! If there’s anything that could help keep morale up after crash landing, it’s endorphins.”

“No.” Venjie took her plate to the crate they used as a wash bin. “I should be leaving. It’ll take me some time to put our ideas together, but I should be back by four.”

Venjie didn’t show up by four. She still wasn’t there when the sun sank into the horizon. Rekha reached out with psi before either of them could ask terrible questions out loud. Venjie was near the other island. Alive, seemed unhurt. She and Alandris frowned, yet kept their questions until Venjie arrived late the next morning.

“I apologize for not being here earlier.” Venjie explained. She seemed disconcerted at how calm her companions were about her delay. “I went to investigate the weapon platform.”

“The tablet was a key?” curiosity had Alandris leaning forward.

Venjie nodded. “Yes.” Her tone peaked with excitement. “The forcefield dropped, and I walked into this incredible building. It has robotic crabs for auto maintenance. The walls are decorated in these intricate details. PDA can’t decide if it’s aesthetic or practical. I found terminals where I downloaded data, though my PDA is still trying to decipher the language. All it’s managed to put together is…”

Rekha wanted to shake her when she didn’t elaborate.

“Venjie?” Alandris spoke.

She shook her head. “It says something about a quarantine. There’s a disease on this planet that the weapon’s builders didn’t want getting off.”

A disease? Most viruses and bacteria couldn’t infect alien life.

“A disease that someone is concerned with not spreading?” Alandris touched her braid. “Either the builders are human or this disease can cross species. Both are very, very bad.”

“I don’t think they’re human.” Venjie held up her PDA. “I scanned these weapons being held in stasis. There’s no way a human culture has these and no one knows about it, let alone the technology to build the alloys, the forcefields, or the stasis chambers! It’s all way beyond our capabilities.”

True alien life. Only a couple of sentient species had been discovered, none of which had been more advanced than hunter-gatherers, let alone spacefaring.This was huge.

“This is momentous.” Alandris said. “And terrifying. All of us, we’re to do daily self-scans. You’ll report any change immediately. In fact, Venjie could I use yours?”

It was handed over and used to scan Rekha. “Scan complete. System normal.” The same was announced for each of them. A collective breath was let out.

“Good.” The doctor nodded. “Let’s get the rest of our gear and head out.”

Venjie’s PDA chose that moment to chirp. “Playing partially translated broadcast.” It announced. They looked at each other. Noise, garbled and grating, sent shivers down her spine. “Nine new biological subjects designated. Mode,” more unnerving noise, “Hunting/analyzing. Sharing subject locations with other agents.”

Why did the PDA find it necessary to give that voice a rather threatening tone?

Angry movements smoothed Alandris’ hair. “Why in the galaxy was it necessary to have that kind of voice installed in the PDA? Remus, what was that?”

Hands trembling, Venjie studied her PDA. “It came from the planet. Another alien broadcast.”

No answers came. Not from the sky, the island, or the vast expanse of ocean, no matter how far Rekha reached. “Another mystery that we can’t solve standing here.” She spoke with as much calm bravado as she could muster. “Let’s get back to doing what we can.”

Wide-eyed disbelief spread on Venjie. Her mouth opened, but Alandris beat her to talking. “Rekha is right. We have work to do.” Alandris nodded and closed the topic. Silently, Rekha followed, helped finish the last of the preparations to leave.

She wasn’t at all looking forward to being towed behind a sub through open water. It was going to be uncomfortable, terrifying, and  _ long _ . Not to mention boring. And agonizingly frustrating now that she had that disturbing broadcast to replay in her brain.

Alandris appeared at her side. “Rekha.” She glanced at the door and Venjie on the other side. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “This is going to be a long trip.”

Yes. It was. She held back a frown when Alandris didn’t keep going.

Hair got irritably shoved back. A breath was huffed. “Will you make it so we can talk? That broadcast…”

A Martian was asking for a telepathic conversation? Willingly? Rekha’s jaw dropped.

“I… Gods. I don’t want to be alone in my head with that for the next few hours.” Alandris spat out.

_ What if I was planning to take a nap instead? _ Rekha opened up.

Alandris jerked, irises thinning to rings.  _ Red gods! I haven’t even lowered my defenses! They don’t mean anything to an H-class, do they? _

_ That’s incredibly rude. You asked for an open comm.  _ Rekha closed the channel and made to walk away. Always with the weapon references!

Alandris stepped in front of her. Fright remained vivid. She fumbled with her braid, met Rekha’s hurt gaze. “I’m sorry.” She glanced over her shoulder to the door. Venjie was peering in. “Please forgive an old soldier her old prejudices.”

Rekha stared into her eyes, studied the fear in them, the plea right beside.  _ I can’t decide if you’re ultra brave or ultra desperate. _

Pulse ragged in her throat, Alandris shrugged.  _ Honestly, I’m not sure. If someone had told me a few months ago that I was going to find myself trusting and appreciating the company of a Delhian, I would have laughed in their face. _

Everything about her posture and tone said she was speaking honestly. Rekha wasn’t sure how to respond. Her insides squirmed at the prospect of having a real friend in the old soldier. A Martian who trusted her. Wow.

“Everything okay in there?” Venjie called.

Alandris offered a weak smile before turning around. “We’re almost done.” She picked up a stray bottle, put it in a locker. The hab system was put into hibernation mode. “Let’s go.”

They left the habitat behind, trekked across the island, and got into the harnesses that Venjie had put together.

“You’re completely certain about this?” Venjie questioned.

_ Can you sense that monster? _ Alandris asked.

_ No. It’s either too far or sleeping. _

_ Oh good. _ “I am not.” Alandris announced. “But I’m going to do it anyway.”

Rekha smiled and settled her mask into place. Alandris did the same. Disbelief was shot at both of them. “Okay. I’ll do a few circles near the surface to test them. Then I’ll dive and make hourly checkins.”

Alandris nodded.  _ You’ll tell her if there’s trouble? _

_ I will. _

There wasn’t. The harnesses worked fine if not comfortably. Turbulence wasn’t even that bad. And the company in her head was pleasant. Rekha could get used to having a friend for long trips. A real friend. One who knew what she was and trusted her anyway. Could she have that with Venjie too? Maybe… maybe more?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nope. No Rylie in my version :D


	6. Venjie's Glorious Habitat

 

The mushroom forest was more than aptly named. For as far as she could see, there were tall stalks of coral as thick and tall as Earth trees, covered in massive fungi. Huge, flat caps that were easily larger than the moth, maybe as large as a multipurpose room. A good, defensible place, if skin-crawling creepy. Few fish. No predators that Rekha could sense. Only beautiful, raylike creatures that sang sad, sad songs. The ‘trees’ were close enough together that a reaper would have difficulty maneuvering, yet far enough apart that a carefully planned base would fit nicely.

Venjie had built an amazing base. It wasn’t large by any means, but it had a moonpool and three multipurpose rooms stacked on top of each other. The corridor from the moonpool led into the middle room. A workshop. Loads of workspace, storage, and two fabricators. Glorious. The top was a bedroom. The bottom was a kitchen and lounge. There was a working radio, a medkit station, and a coffee machine. She also had a hygiene room. The pinnacle of glory! Her habitat was a veritable palace compared to the cramped quarters that Rekha had been stuck in.

Solar panels covering the moonpool provided power for everything. Venjie was in the process of planning expansion for a bioreactor and farm once she’d found the necessary blueprints. And seeds. She kept hoping to find the ship’s small gardening module intact, or at least the seed storage. Seeds were always good trade when hopping between colony worlds.

They didn’t think twice about the three of them sharing the same bedroom. Each got her own small bunk and locker. Rekha marveled at what Venjie had managed to create all by herself. Absolutely incredible given that her PDA had been damaged and lacking most of the necessary blueprints. She’d had to scrape together blueprints for most of by it scanning pieces of wreckage. No wonder the flea had wandered all over the place!

Joy was dampened the next day when Alandris announced that her self-scan reported an unknown bacterial infection. Possibly the same disease that the aliens had set up the quarantine to prevent spreading. Damn. If only the PDA could actually translate more of what Venjie had downloaded from the weapon platform. Some useful information would be nice.

“Here’s a bad idea.” Alandris added to the quiet breakfast table.

Rekha couldn’t help the giddy rush of excitement from being at an actual table instead of squatting on a crate. “What’s that?” she smiled.

“We could see if the  _ Aurora’s _ computer core is still active. It should be able to translate what the PDAs can’t.”

“Go aboard the ship?” wheezed out, her mind and heart overloaded from the terrible memories of the drive core explosion. She dropped her hands under the table to grip at her thighs.  _ Mommy! _ screamed through her head anyway.

Alandris’ eyes went round. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up.” She dropped her gaze, poked at her food.

“You’re right. It’s a monumentally bad idea.” Venjie said. Questioning eyes darted between them. “The ship is unstable. There are fires and debris everywhere. It’s too dangerous.”

“You boarded the  _ Aurora _ after it exploded?” Rekha demanded.

She shrugged. “Radiation was spreading. The shielding needed to be repaired.”

Awe warmed in her chest. She gaped at the bravery it must have taken.

“The computers were starting to fail. Too many compromised systems. I’m sure they’re next to useless now.” Venjie stabbed at her fish.

“We might as well start working like we’ll be stuck here long term.” Rekha found her voice. “Answers could be out there, but they’re going to be hard to find. We need multiple vehicles and at least one more moonpool. Solar panels have been sufficient until now, but we need that reactor to start expanding. A large farm won’t take that much power, but water filtration and power cell charging will.”

The untouched bite on her fork was considered. “Venjie, I can fix your PDA. Then we’ll go over supplies and what we’re lacking for the expansion, make plans to procure more. Fish will be our best source of fuel for the reactor. Edible plants are too precious to waste them for our morality. I think I saw an aquarium in the files. I’ll look into its usefulness. We should set up standard shifts.” She shoved the bite in her mouth.

Venjie and Alandris were staring at her.

She waited for arguments or approval. She frowned when neither came. “Unless you don’t approve?”

Venjie shook her head. They both looked at Alandris.

“Are you waiting for me to tell you to do it?” Alandris asked.

She was used to the chain of command. “You’re senior here,” was her teasing reply.

“Look here, little girl…”

All teasing gone, Rekha added. “We should discuss all changes and moves forward as a crew. It wouldn’t do for one of us to plan use of our resources, but no one else knows about it. The shortages and fights it would cause aren’t acceptable uses of our time.”

Alandris nodded. “I agree.”

“So do I.” Venjie smiled.

“Good. Do either of you have comments on my plan?”

“I agree that we need a reactor before we start expanding. We should plan our base design. The giant coral and fungus will make it tricky.” Venjie gestured out the window at the enormous shelf-like fungi. “The forest is great for its lack of predators, but building in it… Should we move now that we have a crew to defend it?”

Alandris looked at Rekha. The terror of the reaper’s attack was in her eyes. “No.”

“No. I’d rather build around the trees.” Rekha shuddered.

“Okay. Some of the fungal shelves are strong enough to support small modules. Keep that in mind. We can also cut through them if necessary, but it takes hours.”

They spent several days planning the expansion. Several more days were spent implementing the plans. Luckily, the nearby wreck provided more than enough raw material for long corridors and the sections they connected. Five rooms stacked on top of each other for the farm. A room between that and the second moonpool was the reactor. Once they’d gathered more material, another tower for exercise and living quarters. The original small tower would be devoted to workspace and storage. A third tower for recreation and a kitchen.

It seemed like a massive waste of time to build an entire tower for luxuries. Then Rekha thought about how long they could feasibly be stuck here, and it made obvious sense. They needed spaces to decompress from stressful days, to bond with each other over fun instead of work.

Rekha was checking the status of an outdoor growbed when her mind was opened up. Intensely powerful and curious, a presence wondered at her.  _ What. Are. You? _ It vanished as abruptly as it had appeared and left her feeling dizzy. She swayed. What? She reached out, hunting for the psionic who’d touched her mind, found nothing but fish.

Had she hallucinated that?

Beautifully creepy, a glowing ray swam past her head, its light brighter than the dim sunlight streaming down. Her stomach growled. Tired and hungry that’s all. It was late. She stowed her scanner and found a hatch inside, didn’t say anything to her crewmates.

A week later, it happened again. That immense presence. It showed up, questioned her existence, and vanished. This time, Rekha asked her companions about it.

“What?” Venjie frowned at her. “A telepath on this planet? If there’s anything good about this place it’s the lack of psionics.”

Rekha looked at Alandris.

“I haven’t heard anything.” The doctor hummed, a light rasp to her voice. She cleared her throat. “Maybe we should take a day and visit the surface, get some sunlight.”

There was hearty agreement on that. Rekha volunteered to be the one towed. Talk of building a third seamoth was made. As before, it was vetoed. They needed a prawn suit to drill minerals, couldn’t justify the use of resources for convenience on a rest day. A new harness and tow kit were fabricated. Stronger and more comfortable than what Venjie had managed alone.

Alandris motioned the silent gesture that indicated she wanted Rekha to touch her mind.

_ Hourly updates _ , were demanded.

_ I’ll let you know every time I unload into my suit. _

Alandris groaned, earned Venjie’s questioning gaze.

Fear liquified Rekha’s insides. Would Alandris spill her secret now? Would Venjie hate her?

“I wish our suits had designs for waste disposal.” Alandris said aloud. “What shortsighted fool thought that suits designed for deep water shouldn’t have waste disposal? Wouldn’t it be easy enough to include a second d-pocket for that?”

“Maybe Rekha could come up with something.” Venjie shrugged. “She seems to have a knack for tinkering with blueprints.”

Heat flushed her cheeks.

Encouragement smiled at her. “Anyone who can build a kitchen with just a welder and laser cutter deserves a pay raise.”

Her heart fluttered and more heat built in her face. She was rather proud of what she’d managed to create. Oven, cooking surface, and cold storage unit. “Thank you,” rasped out. She swallowed heavily, composed herself. “Thank you. I’ll see what I can do about the suits. I can’t promise anything. They’re really out of my area of expertise.”

 

Intense, natural sunlight burned Rekha’s eyes. Every pebble stabbed her feet through the thin soles of her worn shoes. Within the jungle, hot, dense air choked her lungs.

“Why was this a good idea?” Venjie croaked.

Alandris smiled up at the cloudless sky, tears spilling from her slotted eyes. “Sunlight is good for your health.”

The distant hulk of the _Aurora_ continued to smolder. It would probably take months for the superheated alloys to cool and the fires within to burn out. Rescue would take even longer.  Seeing their old habitat in its valley nest, memory assaulted Rekha, and she reflexively did a sweep for human life. The lack of it had her sitting down. In the excitement of building the forest base, of having crewmates and hope and ideas to share, she’d managed to forget how alone and marooned she was.

Venjie sat beside her. “When you appeared in the middle of the jungle and let me know that I wasn’t alone anymore…” A broken smile curved. “Gods. I’d never been more glad to see anyone in my life. And then it turned out to be you of all people.” Something delicate softened her smile, made it warmer, brighter, ultra attractive.

Rekha gulped.

“I’m glad you’re here,” she suddenly choked. “Not that I would wish this situation on anyone! I wish we were back on the ship, safe and sound with our friends and crewmates. Not like this…”

“I have to agree,” came Alandris’ quiet addition. “I got lucky being down here with the two of you. CTO Yu was a decent officer, but she would have been useless. You two act like children half the time, but at least you’ve got some reasonable skills.”

Venjie stuck out her tongue.

_ Aw, thanks, mom. _

_ Hush, little girl. _

Giggles spilled out of her, and the awful heat was forgotten. Sunlight became a wonderful glow. A breeze tickled their senses. They stayed the rest of the day, crashed in the hab, had fresh crab and melon for breakfast. Happy, sun-drenched memories kept Rekha company as the sun vanished and the water closed in.


	7. Food for Crabs

Alandris was clearing her throat for the third time that morning. The scanner had been reporting increasing bacteria levels in her system over the past two weeks. Today, the scanner's report was almost alarmed at how infected the doctor was. Rekha certainly was.

She kept the report of her own scan to herself. Luckily, she'd done it on first waking, before the others. And no one thought to think that she might be lying. Unknown bacterial infection.

Time to find out if the ship's computers were truly down or simply cut off from external use.

“I think Alandris’ bad idea is one we need to revisit.” Rekha said.

“Go to the  _ Aurora _ ?” Venjie hissed. “Have you gone mad?”

“Do you have any other way to translate the data? Or maybe a cure for the disease that killed all of the Mongols, that  _ will  _ kill Alandris?” Rekha returned.

Venjie gasped angrily, then went pale.

“I'll go.” Rekha explained. “My dive suit will protect me from most of the dangers.” Her telekinesis most others. Unless the ship literally collapsed on top of her. “I'll build a decent radio beforehand; it's been on my to-do list anyway.” Stupid Alterran tech. “If the computer core or transmitters are salvageable, I can handle it.”

Alandris’ expression was hard enough to dent plasteel, though her mouth stayed closed.

“Just yesterday, you were petrified at the idea of going into the  _ Aurora _ . Now, you’re volunteering to go it alone?” Venjie balked.

Rekha shrugged. She still was, but someone needed to. Might as well be her. “Yes.”

“You'll do no such thing!” Venjie jumped to her feet. “I went in alone because I thought I was! Standard safety protocols say it should be two crew in dangerous scenarios.”

“But…”

“She's right.” Alandris wiped at her nose. “Both of you should go.”

Argument raged in her chest. She was more than capable of handling this alone, didn't need to endanger anyone else. That she really didn't want to do it, especially not alone, helped her shove aside the arguments. “If that's the majority.” Rekha submitted.

Venjie gaped at her. “How do you cool your emotions that fast?”

Years of training. “It  _ was  _ my idea that crew consensus should rule.”

“Here I thought you wanted me in charge.” Alandris deadpanned.

She chose not to respond and switched the topic to planning the excursion. They could go tomorrow if Rekha could get radios working tonight. With two seamoths at their disposal, it’d be almost comfortable.

Putting together properly working radios took a lot less time than she expected. She finished three handheld devices and was poking at the moths’ systems before dinner was ready. By bedtime, both moths were upgraded. “Radiation might interfere with long-range communication, and they won’t penetrate a kilometer of stone, but otherwise, we are good to go.” Rekha nodded her triumph.

“Well done, Rekha.” Alandris praised.

“Tell me that when we get back alive,” was Rekha’s dry response.

Alandris eyed her, nodded. “Make sure you do.”

 

Staring at the looming hulk of their dead ship, Rekha wasn’t sure she had full control of her bladder, let alone the willpower to actually enter that death trap.

_ Mommy! _

“Rekha?”

She shook out of memory, realized she was sweating, and wiped her face.

“Hey, Rekha. Did your new radios die already?”

“Sorry, Venjie. No. I was thinking.”

“About how to get in my pants again?” There was a lilt to her tone that said she was joking to lighten the mood. She must be as scared as Rekha.

That revelation found her calm. Her snark returned, “It  _ is _ my favorite subject.” She eased the moth forward, following Venjie around to the front of the wreck, and through the twisted skeleton of the nose, only to stop dead at a shadow moving below. Not a second later, there came the distinct roar of a reaper. Her bladder released control.

Another roar, then another, before she noticed Venjie waving from her moth. She had maneuvered to face Rekha, both of them hiding like prey fish among the metal fingers of the  _ Aurora _ . How was her face that damn calm? Venjie motioned for silence, then gestured movement over to what looked like a ledge. What was left of floor or ceiling of a deck. It sloped into the water, providing a docking spot and place to climb up into the smoldering hell.

When Venjie moved, Rekha followed. They zipped quickly from hiding spot to ledge and set the moths to settle on the ledge. It held, and they exited. Crabs immediately charged at them.

“Little shits.” Rekha grunted as she batted two away with an arm, one with psi when Venjie’s back was to her. 

“Last time I was here, I cleared a path to a hallway there.” Venjie pointed among the shadows. “Hopefully the wreckage hasn’t shifted and blocked it again.” She’d said as much during planning, as well as drawn a rough diagram of what route she’d taken through the hallways and guts of the ship, what was left, what was impossibly blocked, what she hadn’t explored.

Rekha gestured for her to lead, with her repulsor gun and experience. Not to admire her backside. Not like she’d once done, though it intrigued her more now than ever. She nearly slapped herself at the hot wave of emotion that spilled through her at the thought of being forever alone. “Stop it,” she did hiss at herself, thankfully unheard over the waves, groaning metal, and chittering crabs.

There was some shifted wreckage. Venjie complained about a beam that half-covered the blackened doorway in. They had to crawl under it on hands and knees. Knee pads suddenly seemed like an important item that should have been on her to-do list. Sharp edges greeted her not three meters in. Internal explosions must have forced that bulkhead inward like that. A few more meters and the daylight was lost. Inky blackness had to be chased back with lamps. Acrid air, full of the stink of burned  _ everything _ had them putting on rebreathers to keep from coughing the entire way.

Between the damage and darkness, it took Rekha some minutes to orient herself. They were on a lower level. Crew quarters, messhall, hygiene facilities, and recreation. Computer core was above them. The first elevator shaft they encountered had door welded shut by intense heat. The second was totally blocked. Venjie didn’t even aim for the third. She headed to the emergency shafts, cramped tunnels with ladders.

Rekha had used the tunnels a handful of times. Usually only emergency drills, but sometimes when she wanted to avoid people, sometimes for a quiet tryst. Or not so quiet, if she worked especially hard. Not helping, she growled at herself. An hour of climbing, crawling, and even swimming finally saw them at the computer core. There wasn’t as much obvious damage as she’d expected. The jarring of impact and explosion hadn’t set anything loose and the fire suppressants had worked. Ultra lucky. What about the power source?

“Everything is dark.” Venjie spoke. “I wonder if the power lines got severed.”

“More likely the breakers.” Rekha was already at the breaker box, nodding at what she saw. All had been tripped, several needed to be replaced. “It’s the breakers. I need to find a supply closet.”

The nearest was blocked off. The next was in a corridor from her nightmares.  _ Mommy, it hurts _ ! There wasn’t a body, but she didn’t need it to see her crewmate screaming for his mother.

“Rekha?”

Shaking her head, she bulled into the closet, gathered what she needed in a maintenance tote, found a few things that she wanted to take back to base, and refused to answer Venjie’s questions. She steeled herself against Venjie’s forlorn sigh and went to work. A couple breakers were stubborn and required delicate coaxing that she barely had the patience for. She broke the casing of more than one, had to use a welder to repair them before inserting the new breakers.

“Some tech hasn’t changed much in the last few hundred years.” Rekha made herself talk. “Take breakers. The first incarnation was fuses. Copper and glass things that sometimes exploded. Today’s use neither, but the same basic principles are in effect. When the circuit is overloaded, they stop conducting.”

Venjie’s face was in too much shadow to tell her expression. She made a small noise that didn’t express much either. It didn’t matter. The point of talking was to keep Rekha grounded.

“And we still use copper and other conductive metals same as they did in the beginning.” Rekha popped in the last breaker and hit the reset switches. Overhead lights came on, then the board lights on the core. She booted up the nearest access station. “What’s your access level?”

“Not high enough, but I saw the chief log in enough times.” Venjie said as she punched at the keyboard. Access was granted immediately. She fed the data from her pad into the station.

Rekha used another station to check on other systems. Most were down. Radio transmitter was working, but the receiver was fried. Maybe. Information was spotty. She needed to take a physical look. “Checking on the transmitter,” was all she said to Venjie before slipping out.

She was opening a maintenance panel to check wiring when the radio crackled on her handheld. “Where in the lost light did you go?”

“Repairing the transmitter.” Rekha replied. “I did say where I was going.”

“I obviously didn’t hear you or I would have responded! You can’t run off like that!”

“I’ve found the problem.” Rekha ignored the outburst to give a brief report. “Repairs should take an hour. Maybe two.”

There was a long quiet. “Estimated time to translate the message is three hours.” Venjie’s tone was cold. How long would she be angry about this? The rest of the day probably. Focus on something better. The receiver could be fixed. There. She focused on the task with vigor. Venjie could be mad, but the mission would go forward. She was focused enough that she completely forgot she should be on the lookout for hungry predators.

“I was wondering if you would notice me.” Venjie spoke from where she was leaning against a wall. She smiled at Rekha’s squeak and jump. “Good thing it’s just me and not a battalion of crabs.”

“Yea.” Adrenaline pounding in her ears, Rekha frowned and gave the area a brief survey before turning back to her work. “Good thing you aren’t a bunch of hungry crabs.” She really needed to work on her awareness when she was working. It could get her killed on this awful planet.

Despite her fresh resolve, she lost herself in her work. She didn’t come up for air until she was finished and was thoroughly startled by Venjie’s quiet presence. Startled, yet pleased. Venjie shaking her head with what Rekha wanted to think of as a fond smile was a nice way to end a few hours of hard work. That the receiver worked was only icing on the cake. To top even the icing, the reaper wasn’t waiting to eat them the moment they stepped out of the ship’s carcass. Sunset found them safely back at base.

“Well done.” Alandris applauded at the end of their report. “Let’s go over the translated material.”

It was called the Kharaa, and it would kill them all. The disease was a plague that crossed species, no matter kingdom or planet. It killed anything and everything, and the Precursors had been absolutely terrified of it. Imagining a race as technologically advanced as the Precursors unable to find a cure for this super bug was terrifying. Cold-sweat-inducing terrifying!

That was why there was a defense system to keep anyone from landing or leaving. The precursors didn’t want the plague spreading. By the light, Rekha didn’t want it spreading either!

“If they couldn’t find a cure…” Rekha trailed off as she met Alandris’ eye, saw the terror etching deep lines in her face. Not finding a cure wasn’t an option. Alandris was  _ not  _ going to die on this backwater shithole! “We’ll pick up where they left off. The disease research facility; we know it’s pretty deep, but relatively nearby.”

Her companions stared at her. She let them stare as she brought up her PDA and started working on her half-baked plan. “The facility is deeper than our moths can go. We’ll need a modder, a modification station, to create the upgrades we’ll need to explore. It’s one of the few blueprints not in our files. We’ll have to find one in the wreckage to scan. Venjie, we’ll need you to highlight on the map where you’ve done extensive searching. We can assume the modder isn’t there and try other areas.”

“Right.” Venjie swallowed. “And while we’re searching for the modder, we’ll keep an eye out for cave entrances or deep trenches.”

“Maybe we should look for the cave that Bart Torgal said they were going to move to.” Alandris suggested. “Might be an entrance to a deep tunnel system.”

“Good.” Rekha encouraged. “Keep thinking like that. We’ll figure this out.”

“There’s a huge chunk of wreckage that I haven’t been to yet. It’s just at the moth’s current crush limit. Gods, I’ve done salvage on what feels like a thousand chunks of wreckage.” Venjie muttered. “But the idea of squeezing into another dark coffin scares the light out of me.”

“Better that than being food for the crabs.” Alandris managed a twisted grin.

“Ha!” Venjie snorted. “Yes. Anything but that. Okay, we’ve got our plan. Let’s get to it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven't noticed already, I'm taking great liberties with lore, game mechanics, and geography. Try not to line everything up with the game :)  
> Have a great day!


	8. To Be Blunt

There were a lot of reasons that Rekha had chosen a career as a prawn technician instead of operator. One, operators were often called to work long shifts, trapped inside their prawn. Entire days were often spent in the thing. Eating, pissing, shitting, being completely, utterly alone. Two, they often worked inside cramped, dark spaces, the threat of death at every corner. Places like asteroids and shipwrecks.

Rekha squinted at the wreckage in front of her. It was cold and lifeless, superheated alloys long since cooled in the dark water; what electronics had survived were now inert. Fish swam in and around the hulk. Their glowing bodies barely pushed back the mass of shadows that lurked within. The seamoth’s lamps illuminated a fraction of the insides that could be seen through the tear in the hull. Inside would be a pitch dark mess. Everything would be topsy-turvy, doors would need cutting through; it’d be painfully easy to get lost or trapped under shifting debris. The walls would close in, she’d run out of oxygen, and the damn fish would eat her.

Fear fluttered in her chest, made her insides clench and outsides sweat. “You’re doing this.” Rekha scolded herself. “It has to be done.”

She put on her mask, checked her gauges.

She climbed out of her moth and swam toward the wreckage. A hole in the side let her in. Shadows moved in the flashlight’s beam. Metal groaned. Monsters howled. Fear slammed her heart into overdrive and set her lungs hammering. She needed out. She needed out now!

Twisting, she looked for the exit. It was gone. The shadows got thicker, darker, hungrier. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t see. She was going to die!

No.

No!

Anger grabbed hold of her panic and wrestled it into submission. She had work to do. There wasn’t time to panic over nonsense. The idiotic bravado that had convinced her to crawl into this creaking terror box was gone, sure, but she could replace it with grim determination.

Rekha retrieved the flashlight that she had dropped and started a proper search despite her trembling hands. Broken equipment, dead terminals, and curious fish. A coffee mug. Crates full of more broken equipment. Ooh some nutrient bars. Peanut butter and vanilla flavors. Nice. Someone’s hat and jacket. Rekha pocketed the clothes. Dry, they would be a nice addition in the habitat. Two PDAs.

No bodies. As usual. There were bones though, almost an entire skeleton, picked clean. Who had it been?

No time to mourn. Move on.

A dead end. She spent a good twenty minutes cutting a hole in the door to the next section. Another useless section. Another door to cut through. Crabs jumped at her. Dammit! She psi-punched them into the bulkhead. Heart pounding, she floated with her back to a wall. Chronometer said she’d been in there for over an hour. Light! Already?

She pushed off the wall to investigate a jumble of crates. Her scanner found chunks of a modder. Yes! It took another half hour of hunting and scanning, but she managed to piece together an entire blueprint. Success!

A new, freshly terrifying noise echoed through the water.

Her sixth sense said nothing unusual was out there. The usual small prey fish. Couple of small sharks.

The noise shrieked again.

What?

Carefully, as stealthily as possible, Rekha made her way to the exit and peeked out. She saw nothing for a while. Around the time her hands stopped shaking, she saw a strange shape moving through the water. It was almost humanoid with a head, torso, and arms. It had tentacles for propulsion, but its head was overly large and had two scythes for upper appendages. Like most of the locals, it had luminescence and its general movements were that of a hunter. Tremors made their way into her hands again.

She took a chance and swam out of the wreckage toward a cluster of giant bulbs for a closer look. What in the galaxy was that thing? It had no feel of life, no thoughts or semblance of them. For all her sixth sense could tell, it could be a moving rock. Her eyes tracked the hunter. What was it?

There was a brief swirl of light, much like a phasegate activation. The hunter vanished. Where it had been was a frenzy of bubbles. She cast her gaze in every direction and didn’t see it. There were monsters down here that could  _ teleport _ ?

How could this planet possibly be getting worse?

 

Rekha passed on what she’d seen to her companions over dinner.

“It did  _ what _ ?” Alandris barked, fell to coughing.

“It effectively teleported.” Rekha confirmed, glad that she’d regained control over her shaking limbs before coming home.

“Wait. Can we back up a lightyear and go over the fact that Rekha went to investigate wreckage by herself?” Venjie huffed.

Alandris pushed stray hair from her face. “Rekha, we had this conversation the other day! How did boarding the  _ Aurora _ not drive that home?”

“I took no unnecessary risks. It was a task that needed to be done.”

“You could have been killed!” Venjie threw at her.

“I could be killed right outside this window,” was Rekha’s dry comeback.

Alandris wagged a furious finger at her. “That is not the point here, Rekha.”

“I’ve heard you chastise more than a few prawn operators when they let their suits get damaged instead of following safety protocol.” Venjie added.

“I’m not some reckless exo-head racing her prawn like a rebellious teenager because I’ve got cabin fever!” Rekha seethed. “I’m part of a crew on a desperate mission with an impossible timeframe. Both of you were busy with other projects. We don’t have time for one of us to twiddle their thumbs just because it’d be safer to do something in pairs!”

“Rek-”

Her hand cut through the air. “No.” She battled her fury to keep it safely within her own skull. “Our priority is to find a cure. And if one of us is expendable, it’s not the doctor or the one with geology training.” She was just an AWOL soldier. “I’m going to do everything in my power to find that cure and get us off this planet.”

“Rekha…” puffed from Venjie, yet no further argument came.

Hot air hissed through her teeth, and she whirled, storming out of the room.

 

Rekha sighed at the view beyond the window. They were eating breakfast and about to embark on another long day in an endless string of long days. “It’d be nice to have gills, wouldn’t it? No need to worry about constantly refilling O2 tanks or c-”

“Eugenics, like a lot of other weapons programs, were banned by the Charter for a reason!” Venjie’s tone sizzled with an abrupt anger.

Rekha bit her tongue at the ferocity. Mere mention of eugenics and weapons programs got her angry this fast? She couldn’t meet Venjie’s sharp gaze.

Alandris blew her nose and spoke, voice awkward from her clogged sinuses and irritated throat. “Yes. But genetic manipulation in preventive medicine remains perfectly acceptable.”

“Turning people into fish isn’t the same as eradicating Huntington’s disease.”

“What about colonization?” Alandris pushed. “On otherwise uninhabitable rocks, simple genetic changes would allow humanity to spre-”

“No.” Venjie refused to allow the topic. “We aren’t having this discussion.” She pushed her breakfast aside. “I’m going to prep my moth.”

Heavy stomping took her from the room.

“You should tell her.” Alandris prodded Rekha.

“Tell her I’m the product of a weaponized eugenics program? You heard what she said about eugenics debates. She thinks we’re all monsters.”

“You need to set her straight about that.” Alandris didn’t back down. “Like you did me.”

“By fighting off a bigger monster, then breaking down in the middle of an alien jungle?” Rekha snorted.

Alandris shrugged. “Not that I’m eager to be the third wheel around here, but she needs to know so she can hurry up and get over it, and you two can stop all this awkward tension.”

Rekha laughed. “I think you’re confused. All the awkward tension is just me. She’s told me several times what she thinks of my flirting.”

“Has that been recent or was it back on the  _ Aurora  _ where you weren’t looking for anything more than a few hours of fun?”

That gave her pause. On the  _ Aurora _ she’d never bothered to consider a relationship that was more than fun sex. A partner wouldn’t like secrets, and anyone would run the moment they learned about Rekha’s biology. Run, turn her in, both.

“I see.” Alandris hummed. “To be blunt, because I understand how incredibly dense you are, Venjie likes you.”

 

An hour later, Rekha went in search of Venjie, found her in one of the work rooms.

“Venjie?” Rekha spoke softly. “Could we talk?”

Venjie lifted her attention from the worktable. “Of course.”

Rekha chewed her lip. This was a terrible idea.

“Rekha? What is it?” Concern laced her tone, made it soft and inviting. It lured Rekha into swallowing her fear and opening up.

“I have something important to tell you. There’s no easy way to say it. I’ll just have to lay it out and hope for the best.”

“Have either of you seen m-” Alandris paused mid-word as she walked into the room. “Oh. Sorry. Am I interrupting?”

Venjie gestured at Rekha.

“I was about to tell Venjie that I,” she sucked in as much courage as her lungs could hold. “That I’m a revised person.”

Shock blew Venjie’s eyes wide open, made her breath hiss. “What?”

“I am not Alterran, though I grew up in its territories. I am Delhian, a psionic soldier. Or, I was. I left Delhi several years ago, and I have no intention of ever returning.” Rekha found her words coming out faster, as Venjie’s expression shifted from disbelief to hurt to anger. “I’m sorry that I’ve been lying since we met. I’ve wanted to tell you for a long time, but… I’ve been too afraid.”

“I don’t believe you.” Venjie’s tone was cold.

Rekha used psi to lift a water bottle and shift it across the room. “It’s true.”

Silence stretched out, heavy and awful, slowly suffocating Rekha as she watched Venjie’s anger solidify. Hate burned in her eyes.

Venjie suddenly whirled on Alandris. “You knew about this?”

Alandris nodded, a calm smile on her face. “If it wasn’t for her revisions, I wouldn’t be alive. It took a while, but I’ve come to trust her. Her psionics have proven rather useful on this gods-forsaken planet.”

Venjie spat. “Delhian soldiers must be able to brainwash people now too, because I can’t believe a true Martian would ever trust one.” She gave Rekha a disgusted look. “Don’t bother trying to get in my head. I’ve got cerebral shielding.”

Cerebral shielding strong enough to block Rekha wouldn’t fit in a tiny skull implant. Human bio-electrics weren’t enough for the wattage that sufficient shielding would require. “I don’t have any intention of it, Venjie.”

“No.” She growled. “You don’t get to be that personal,  _ Dogar _ . You may address me as Engineer Remus. Or Remus.”

She managed to smooth her expression despite her crumbling heart. “Yes, Engineer Remus.”

Venjie grew even angrier and stormed from the room. The sound of her seamoth engine whirring and speeding off made Rekha choke. She glared at Alandris. “Yes. Tell Venjie that I’m revised. She likes me. She’ll get over it.”

Contrition tightened Alandris’ features. “I really didn’t think she’d react like this.”

Rekha closed her eyes, felt hot tears fall. “I need to be alone.”

Alandris made noise as though to argue. She sighed. “You know where to find me if you need me,” was said softly.

She stalked to her bed and collapsed in it to cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually had most of chapters 7 - 10 written months ago. They just needed a little filler and editing. It's been so long since I've worked with this fic! I hope I didn't make any weird mistakes. Lately, I've been working like mad to finish an original novel that I started a few years ago, and my head needed a break. This fic was exactly what I needed to relax :D


	9. Trapped

“She’s been gone too long,” coughed Alandris.

Rekha sighed. “It’s only been a day, old woman.”

“Yes, little girl. A day. On this planet, where  _ every living thing wants to kill us. _ ”

She’d been trying not to think about that.

“Check up on her.”

“She’s alive.”

Alandris made an angry gesture. “Check on her.”

Anger flared. “I can’t do that without invading her privacy, Alandris!” She yelled. “You were there when she told me to stay out of her head!”

“Why must you be so stubborn?”

“Venjie’s spent the most time alone  _ surviving  _ on this hellhole. The seamoth was fully charged. It’s always stocked with two days’ rations. She’s fine.”

Ferocity glared back at her. “At 48 hours on the dot, Rekha, you will reach out and check on her. End of discussion.”

The next 20 hours were immeasurably stressful. Rekha kept glancing to the windows and mentally reaching out, but every time, Venjie remained kilometers away with no sign of returning. Damn their lack of long-distance comms. A few kilometers distance, a few meters of rock, even the vaguest anomalies could block a signal. Venjie would answer a status report. No matter how much she hated Rekha and Alandris now, the fact remained that they were stronger as a team. Venjie was angry and hurt, not stupid.

So when was she going to turn around and come back? They had work to do.

The cyclops wasn’t going to build itself. Venjie wouldn’t let Alandris die of this horrible disease. Would she? No. She wasn’t that petty. Rekha wouldn’t have such strong attraction to her if she was.

Rekha sipped at her cup of cold coffee. Forty six hours. She should be sleeping, not waiting up like a worried mother for a rebellious child to return home. Yet she was. And Venjie was as far away as the day before. In fact, she didn’t seem to have moved. Had she built another habitat wherever she was? Wh-

“Is she on her way back yet?” Alandris asked from the doorway.

“No.”

Alandris moved into the common area and slid into a chair. They waited together for the next two hours.

“Timer for Engineer Remus’ return is up,” chimed her PDA.

Rekha knew that Venjie wasn’t close before she even reached out.

Alandris raised an eyebrow.

“What the hell do I even say? She’s going to be furious.” Rekha stalled.

“Hello usually works,” was the dry response.

“Ugh!”

“What’s your status? Are you hurt? Do you need help? Those are also standard.” Alandris deadpanned.

Why was life so hard?

“Rekha.” Alandris’ tone was hard. “Check on her.”

Fine. It wasn’t like Venjie could hate her more. She reached out, found Venjie’s mind, gently felt for a way in. The cerebral shielding buzzed an irritating static. She spent a careful minute getting around it.

Fear assaulted her.

She recoiled and had to get past the shield again. Ready for the fear, she let it sweep past her, and made contact.  _ Hello?  _ was her soft call.  _ I apologize for the intrusion, but we need a status update. _

_ Rekha?  _ shrieked at her. _ By the Charter! Is that you? _

_ Yes. Ven-Engineer Remus, you’ve been gone two days. Alandris asked me to check on you. _

What sounded like terrible laughter came back. Rekha cringed.

_ Again, I apologize for intruding. Just, please, give me a status update so I can p- _

_ I’m trapped!  _ interrupted her.  _ There’s a reaper out there. It chased me into this cave, gods, twenty hours ago! It won’t leave! I ran out of power four hours ago. I’ve only got a couple hours of air left in my tanks. They weren’t full when I stormed out of the habitat. _ Venjie was spitting out words too fast, they were running together and blurring.

Rekha cut in,  _ Why are you already out of power? _ A fully charged power cell should keep a moth going for several days on standard use. Venjie was only a few hours away.

_ I had to overuse the defense system. The reaper had me in its jaws, Rekha! It wouldn’t let go until I’d used three full-power charges! _

Three charges. Reapers usually let them go after one. What was possessing this one?

_ Rekha? Are you still there? By the Charter, how are you even talking to me? Is the shielding not… no the readouts are green. _ A deep pause.  _ How? _

_ Whoever sold you that implant failed to mention that it has serious limitations. _

_ But w- _ she cut off to shriek and whimper.

_ What happened? _ Rekha demanded. She was reluctant to fully slip into Venjie’s mind to tap her senses.

_ You’re in my head _ , snapped at her.  _ Didn’t you see? _

_ I’m trying my best to respect your privacy, Engineer Remus. I…  _ she paused.  _ I only opened up a comm channel. _

Several moments passed.

Rekha bit her tongue.

_ The reaper roared into the cave and scared me.  _ Venjie sighed.  _ Please come help me. _ The last was given softly.

_ What’s your location? _

A few minutes later, she had a good idea of where Venjie was. It’d take almost two hours to get there at max speed. Venjie had less than three hours of oxygen in her tanks.

“You were right.” Rekha grumbled at Alandris. “She’s in trouble.”

“I figured that by the length of the conversation,” snarked back.

Rekha huffed. “She’s trapped in a cave by a rather persistent reaper. She overused the defense system, and she’s on tank air.”

Alandris rose as she did. “Okay. Where is she?”

“In the bulb zone near the weapon platform.”

“That’s over three hours away. How long does she have?”

“I’ll have to push the seamoth.” Rekha avoided the question. She grabbed several water bottles, cooked potatoes, and two med kits. “I’m going to take a spare power cell.”

“How long does she have?”

Rekha checked her tanks. Half full. Good enough. “Long enough.” She suited up, put her mask in the d-pocket along with the other emergency supplies. Seaglide and flashlight were already in there. “Seen the stasis rifle?”

“Not recently.”

Damn. She grabbed the one creature decoy they’d managed to build.

Alandris grabbed her arm. “How long does she have?”

“Less than three hours.”

“Shit.” She let go. “Hurry up! What are you sitting around for?”

Rekha chose not to respond. She hopped into the waiting moth.  _ I’ll keep you updated _ .

_ You better. _ Alandris huffed.

The moonpool dropped her into the water, and she hit the throttle. The moth shot forward. She didn’t divert course except for rocks and reefbacks. Fish and kelp banged into the shield. Her hands hurt with how tightly she gripped the controls. Get there in time, was her mantra. At the hour mark, in a quiet stretch of water, she checked in.

_ I’m an hour out. How are you? _

_ Gods, Rekha. You really don’t have any trouble with this shield do you? _

_ No.  _ She couldn’t allow the effort to mince words.

_ I’m still alive, if that’s any sort of report. Reaper can’t get at me, but it still won’t leave. _

_ Did you steal its eggs or something? _

_ I wish I had! It’d be a good reason for this problem! _

Rekha curved over a roll in the seabed.

_ Do you have a plan? _ Venjie asked.

_ I brought the decoy. If that doesn’t work, I’ll distract it while you get in my moth. Then I’ll hop in yours. _

_ What? That’s it? Then you’ll be trapped! _

A shark leapt out of the sand. It couldn’t get a grip, yet its hard teeth scraped loud enough to warn her that she’d have hull repairs to deal with later.

_ Trapped with a fresh power cell. I’ll be fine, Remus. I need to concentrate on steering. I’ll check in when I’m in the vicinity. _

Rekha gathered herself in time to narrowly avoid another shark. Damn aggressive fauna. The next hour was impossibly longer and more stressful than the last. Horrible scenarios ran through her head. The reaper getting into the cave somehow. Rekha not arriving in time and finding a breathless corpse. Not being able to distract the reaper adequately and it making a meal of Venjie while she was swimming to the other moth.

She wanted to scream. Maybe later, she told herself. If that reaper wanted a fight, she was more than willing to take it head on. She was prepared this time. Prepared and stronger. Weeks on this planet pushing her mental muscles by tracking survivors, then talking to Alandris, smacking irritating crabs and sharks and catching fish… On top of the actual training exercises that she’d worked on, because she knew that there’d come a time where she would have to face a leviathan again. It was a given on this planet.

Bright blue orbs appeared ahead. Finally! She veered around a hunting ampeel, giving the electric predator a wide berth. Where was the canyon that - yes. There.

Rekha touched Venjie’s mind, breathed a sigh of relief that there was a live mind to touch.  _ I’m close. _

_ Finally! I’ve got twenty minutes. _

_ Be ready to run. _

_ Oh, I am. _

She prepped the decoy and turned off the exterior lamps, brought the moth to a stop.

_ Remus, may I see through your eyes? _

_ Do I have a choice? _

Rekha sighed at the lack of trust.  _ Yes. _

There was a long hesitation.  _ I suppose it’ll help to see where you’re going. Yes. You may. _

Rekha fully slipped in, peering into the darkness, hearing Venjie pant, feeling her racing heart. Okay, yes. That outcrop was unique. Okay. She came back and hunted for the outcrop she’d seen. Very close. She reached for the reaper’s presence. It was circling directly above Venjie’s location, hungry, agitated, focused.

Painfully slowly, she eased the moth directly in view of Venjie and aimed it at the bulb forest. They’d provide some cover to dodge in if events went poorly. She got out and used the nearly silent seaglide to take her a good distance the opposite direction. No more time. She strapped the decoy to the seaglide.

_ In three, I’ll turn on the decoy. _

_ I’m ready. _ Venjie gasped.

_ Three. Two. One. _ She flicked on the decoy.

The reaper roared. Another roar and it whipped in her direction. She let the seaglide go.

_ Run for my moth. Now! Now! Now! _

Roaring furiously, the reaper was already over her head and catching up on the decoy. Venjie was almost across the canyon. Half her attention on the reaper, Rekha headed for the abandoned moth. She felt Venjie’s sigh of relief and gave one of her own. Venjie was safe now.

_ Stay along the seabed. Move slowly. Keep the lights off. _

Roars echoed in the canyon. The reaper’s presence started back their way. No! Too soon!

_ Rekha? _

_ No noise! _

The damaged seamoth chose that moment to let loose a stream of bubbles. 

The reaper roared, its focus clear.

_ Run! Go, go, go!  _ Rekha screamed.

Venjie hesitated.  _ What about you? _

_ Go! _ Rekha slammed the fresh power cell in the abandoned moth and aimed a psychic yell at the reaper. Its motion stuttered. Venjie’s moth darted into the darkness. Rekha hit the accelerator and put herself between reaper and Venjie. She turned the lamps on and yelled as loud as she could.

The reaper howled and charged at her.

She sped away. It chased. She darted in and out of caves, around every possible obstacle, and kept trying to psychically deter it. It refused to give up. The monster was set and determined to destroy the little shell and its soft insides. Dammit! She started to gear up a full psionic attack. No. There was half a seamoth in her way. It’d not only damage her moth, but halve the attack’s effectiveness. Either lose the monster somewhere or get out and face it barehanded.

It appeared in front of her. What? How? Wh-

Metal shrieked as its powerful mandibles grabbed hold, sunk its impossibly sharp mandibles deep into the chassis.

“Let me go, you light deprived asshole!”

It roared and bit at her lamps.

She hit the defense system. A powerful electric field was discharged, zapping the monster and lighting up the depths. It didn’t let go. Metal continued to shriek. Ten seconds later, the system was ready again. She hit it. Electricity sizzled in the darkness, but the reaper refused to give up its prey. The structural integrity of the seamoth dropped in half. Fine. Hand to hand it was. She jumped out of the moth.

While the reaper was busy finishing the destruction of her vehicle, Rekha focused her mind. She gathered her anger, her will to survive, and her righteous indignation that she just wanted to go home!

The moth died in a flurry of bubbles, and as soon as the reaper tossed its carcass aside, Rekha sent her psionic attack directly into its face. Water rippled in every direction. Blood drifted up. A slow blink passed across four eyes.

Her second attack landed as it shook off the first.

Her third was filled with simple animal rage.  _ Ahhh! _

There was a resounding  _ crack _ . Teeth fell. Blood gushed upward. One eye blinked. Then two.

Rekha charged into its simple mind and started carving.

Long and low, a whine gurgled from the reaper. Its entire body shuddered, twisting back and forth, contorting in pain and confusion. A second whine followed. Three eyes blinked. Rekha noticed odd bumps covering its form. Pain and fear totally swamped its aggressive anger. It tried to get away. As it turned, the flickering light of her dead moth illuminated green sores along the white body.

The Carar.

Had the disease driven the reaper mad?

The reaper was sluggishly moving away. Her first reflex was to not let it go, to finish what  _ it _ had started. Her next was to let it go. Let it suffer the long, slow, painful death that the disease offered. Another pained whine came from the creature. Her heart ached at the sound. Dammit. She returned to the animal’s mind, searched for the softest spot. It got nearly thirty meters away before she found it. There.

It twitched once and began to sink.

Damn this planet and its insane problems!

She watched the dead leviathan for a few moments before starting to swim for home. Home. The thought that she’d called the habitat home made her snort and remember that she’d promised to keep Alandris updated.

_ Alandris. _

_ Rekha! Status update, now! _

_ Venjie is on her way back. Reaper’s dead. It was infected. _

_ The Carar? _

_ Yes. _

There was quiet for a while. Rekha saw an ampeel ahead and started the slow detour around. Should’ve brought a second seaglide. She had more than enough air to make it to the surface, and her tanks would recharge with enough time up there, but she was going to have to sleep in the open tonight. Swimming home was going to take a  _ long _ time.

_ How are you?  _ Alandris asked softly.

_ Tired. _

_ Going to sleep in your moth tonight? Got enough power? _

_ No moth _ , was her tiredly honest response.  _ Reaper destroyed it. Seaglide’s gone too. _

Alandris gasped, coughed. Strange how physical coughs came through the psi channel.  _ Have you told Venjie? _

_ No. _

_ Tell her, you dumb bulkhead. _

_ Yes, doctor. _ Rekha didn’t think, just did as ordered.  _ Remus. Reaper’s dead. _

_ Rekha! Rekha, are you okay? I … I heard your fight. I  _ felt _ it. Gods, you’re strong, aren’t you?  _ Venjie’s tone shifted from panicked to awed. It occurred to Rekha that she hadn’t felt the cerebral shield.

_ You turned off your shield. _

Venjie laughed.  _ A perfect waste of energy, wasn’t it? _

_ Yes. _

_ You have no sense of humility, do you? _

Rekha yawned and wondered if she should aim for the mountain. Sleep in the alien facility. Would she get there before she fell asleep?

_ I don’t boast about my psionic strength, only my prowess in bed. _ Another yawn.

_ You sound tired. Are you okay? _

_ Adrenaline crash. I didn’t sleep much last night, and I was still awake when Alandris made me check on you. That fight took a lot out of me. Oh, and I’m swimming for the mountain. _

_ You’re what?  _ squeaked at her.

Rekha sighed. Right. Alandris had said to tell her.  _ Reaper wrecked the moth. No seaglide. I’m swimming for the mountain. _

_ No, you’re not _ . Venjie barked,  _ I’m coming back. _

_ Don’t. Seamoth is a one-person vehicle. There’s no point. _

_ I’m coming back. Where are you? _

_ Bu- _

Venjie cut her off.  _ Where. Are. You? _

Too tired to keep arguing, the flashlight was pulled out.  _ Above the bulbs. I have my flashlight on. _ She kept swimming. If Venjie felt she needed to keep her company all night, then so be it. Artificial light cut through the darkness five minutes later. Rekha flashed her light a few times. The moth lamps turned in her direction and easily caught up with her.

_ Hello.  _ Rekha gave a little wave.

_ Don’t ‘hello’ me. Get in. _

Rekha blinked. She squinted into the tiny cabin.  _ You have noticed the distinct lack of a second chair, yes? _

The hatch opened. Venjie gestured angrily.  _ Get in. There’s room if you remove your tanks first. You can sit in my lap. _ Venjie must have already stowed her tanks and mask because her face was uncovered and wearing an unhappy frown.

_ There’s not r- _

_ Get. In. _

Why were the only other people on this planet so damn commanding?

_ Yes, Engineer Remus _ .

Her flippers were awkward to tug off, and she spun in the water twice before managing to stow them. She paused to yawn. Spots erupted in her vision. Sleep sounded absolutely amazing right about now. Get the gear off, she reminded herself. Can’t fall asleep here or Venjie will get angry and break both their necks dragging Rekha inside.

She took several long breaths, held the last, and stripped off her tanks. They went into her d-pocket, and she swam to the moth. It looked as small as it had a minute ago. She slid her legs in. Hands guided her down until she was planted squarely in Venjie’s lap. Her head brushed the top of the cabin.

“Get the hatch.”

Rekha couldn’t comfortably twist to do it. She used psi to pull it down and turn the lock. She stowed her mask.

Water dripped from her to the moth’s floor.

Arms were suddenly around her middle, squeezing tight, pressing Venjie into Rekha’s back. “I’m so sorry,” was whispered against her shoulder. “By the Charter, I misjudged you, Rekha.”

She made a noise, but couldn’t form words.

“You fought a reaper for me.”

“I won’t have to fight them anymore. I found the soft spot.” Rekha said.

The arms around her stiffened. “The soft spot?”

“I know how to kill them.”

“You can kill them with your mind,” wasn’t a question.

“Yes.”

Slowly, Venjie relaxed into Rekha’s frame. “Going by the stories, I always imagined that a telepathic intrusion would be excruciating.”

“If you’d been actively blocking me, forcing my thoughts into your head would’ve given you a headache,” was her factual reply. “I was careful not to overload your shield generator.”

“You know just how to make a girl feel comfortable,” grumbled into her back.

“My apologies, Remus. I’ll keep my thoughts to myself from now on.”

Glowing fish darted across her vision. A crabsquid considered their moth, and Rekha encouraged the concept that they were an odd rock and not worth investigating. It squirted away.

“It didn’t feel like anything at all.”

What? Rekha couldn’t stop a yawn. “What didn’t?”

“You in my head.”

Oh.

“I think I felt something after you asked to look through my eyes, a sort of pressure.”

Standard experience. Rekha caught sight of an ampeel lurking at the edges of their lamplight.

“Dammit, Rekha, would you stop?”  
Stop what? She twisted to try and look at Venjie. “What?”

“Stop being so damn accommodating!” growled at her. “I tell you to stop using my given name, and you do. I tell you to stay out of my head, and you do until I disappear for two days, then apologize for asking if I’m okay. I say that your responses are making me uncomfortable  _ and you stop talking _ .”

“Which means you want me to keep being accommodating by abiding by your order to  _ not _ be accommodating.” Rekha huffed. “Would you make up your mind?”

Venjie stiffened again. “Could you force me to?”

“No! I can do a lot of things, but I can’t force you to think or believe something that you don’t want to. But I’d love it if you would. This back and forth over whether you trust me isn’t pleasant.” Irritation, hurt, and tiredness made her sharp. “I’m an H-class psionic, trained in the Delhian military. I’m capable of hurting and killing with my mind, but I don’t like doing it. I didn’t like being a soldier. I don’t want the future that Delhi had planned for me!”

Rekha’s breath rushed in and out of her lungs. Her eyes burned with unshed tears. “Alandris is my friend. You were my friend. I wanted more than that with you, but since you obviously don’t, could we return to neutral crewmates? Please stop making me feel like a monster. I’m not one of the villains in your parents’ war stories. I left Delhi and will never go back.” She sniffed. Hot tears spilled over her cheeks. “Neither of you would even know I was psionic if my abilities didn’t help keep us alive.”

Venjie didn’t seem to have anything to say to that, so Rekha continued quietly crying and watching the glowing, deadly life swimming around them.

“Can you reach the controls?” eventually came from Venjie. “I can’t see, and we should get moving.”

“Um.” Rekha shifted, got distracted by the fact that Venjie’s arms remained tight about her middle.

“Rekha?”

Her lips moved. She stared. One of her hands moved to touch what her eyes didn’t believe.

“That’s my arm.”

“You’re hugging me.”

Venjie heaved a breath. “I’m trying to convince my head what my heart knows. Can you drive or not?”

Her pulse fluttered at what Venjie might or might not be implying. Controls, where were they? It was awkward, yet doable. She got the moth turned about. “Yes. I can drive.”

“Think you can stay awake to make it home?”

At normal speed, almost four hours? Her eyelids felt heavier thinking about it. “Probably not.”

“Take us to the mountain.”

“Yes, captain.”

“Smartass,” sounded like Venjie might have smiled.

Short a distance away as the mountain was, by the end of the half hour drive, Rekha could barely keep her eyes open. She did manage to sense the local leviathan and give it a wide berth. It never noticed them. In the shallows, she parked the moth and let her head bob.

“Up, you lump. We aren’t sleeping like this. I won’t be able to walk tomorrow if we do.” Venjie waved a hand at the hatch.

“This was your idea.” Rekha grumbled back.

“Just climb out.”

She did and waded out of the surf, eyed the moonlit beach for pesky crabs. Venjie’s touch on her arm startled her.

“Come on.”

She followed behind, half an eye on the beach, the other half drooping asleep. Damn these last two days had been exhausting. Her feet tripped as they stepped from mobile sand to solid metal. The precursor facility. She frowned up at the giant weapon.

Inside, despite the lack of forcefield, was blissfully free of crabs. Living crabs. Mechanical ones skittered about on their routes to keep the place maintained. Venjie guided them to a corner that was neither dark nor comfortable looking, just like the entirety of the facility. Why was there lighting on nearly every surface? What purpose was there in that much wasted resource? The exterior didn’t glow. Why the interior? Did the precursors enjoy it that much?

A bedroll appeared in Venjie’s hands. “I always keep one on hand,” was explained as she smoothed it out on the floor. She sat on the end of it. “Come on.”

Rekha sat as well. Her eyes closed.

“You did all the hard work today. You get to lie down. I’ll sit up.”

Okay.

“Use me as a pillow, will you? I know you’re a side sleeper.”

Rekha chose not to think about what was happening. The energy cost was too high, and her reserves were too low. Head met soft thigh. “Good night.”

Fingers touched her temple. “Sweet dreams, Rekha.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *magnificent laughter* I bet you didn't expect to get a slew of updates in one day, did you? Nope. You didn't. (neither did I)


	10. The Scary Psionic

Morning was mostly finished by the time Rekha opened her eyes. She sat up stiffly, everything aching.

“Good morning,” greeted her.

Rekha flinched as the previous day flooded into her.

Venjie was rubbing her thigh with a relieved expression. “Gods, I didn’t want to wake you; you deserved your sleep, but my leg has been cramped up for hours.”

Rekha rolled her shoulders and stretched silently. She had no idea what to say about the previous day’s events. “Thank you,” was what she managed.

Rubbing stopped. Venjie’s expression was expectant.

Out of words, she pulled breakfast from d-storage, silently offered some. With a sigh from Venjie, it was accepted. Rekha nibbled, both famished and not hungry at all. Venjie stared at hers. Mechanical crabs skittered past on their high-priority assignments. 

“My legs are going to be numb again by the time we get home,” puffed out of Venjie.

“What?” Rekha squinted. “Why?”

“We should really look into designing a two person moth.”

“Don’t you have a seaglide on you? I’ll use that to get home.”

Venjie’s brow wrinkled. “Don’t be stupid. A glide will take forever.”

The other day all Venjie seemed to want was as much space as possible from Rekha. Since last night, she was almost clinging. It didn’t make sense. And Rekha was too emotionally drained to try and process. “I’m rested and capable of defending myself again. There’s no need to pack both of us into the moth.”

Tortured amber eyes squinted at her. “If you were fitted with cerebral tech like back during the wars, that reaper would’ve been a pile of mush the moment you were in range, wouldn’t it? Gods, you could’ve taken on a whole squad of reapers, couldn’t you?”

H-class with boosters were an army unto themselves. With the modern boosters that Delhi was illegally improving...

Rekha watched a mechanical crab scurry right up a wall, open a panel in it and poke at the dark interior. The panel was closed, and the crab moved along the wall to another. How nicely simple that life was. She wanted to go back to repairing and maintaining the  _ Aurora’s  _ fleet of prawn suits.

“Or are you still hiding things from us?”

Rekha stood. “I’ll take the long way back.”

Venjie stiffened as though readying herself for an attack, yet Rekha merely walked toward the exit. “You’re going to  _ swim _ ?” squawked out.

Rekha kept moving, the strange metal floor cold under her bare feet.

“Rekha!”

Bright sunlight assaulted her, and she had to shield her eyes. An organic crab tried next. She batted it aside with psi. From the d-pocket, she started pulling her equipment. Her tanks were at a third. Hadn’t she had half last night? Dammit. That would only get her to the shallows. She’d have to find some place to perch and wait for the tanks to refill.

“You can’t be serious,” barked at her. Venjie had followed and moved in front of her. She tried to block Rekha’s path.

Rekha shouldered past, tried to. A hand grabbing her bicep stalled her. “Why is everything a fight with you?” Rekha complained at Venjie’s hand.

“You’re the one trying to do something stupid,” argued with her.

It really was. Rekha watched the wind play with the plants around them, the sound of it nostalgic, reminding her of the colony moon she’d grown up on. Maybe she should wait here on the beach while her tanks filled. A few hours delay wasn’t an ultra problem.

“Crewmates protect each other, you stubborn bulkhead.” Venji huffed, but her grip didn’t budge. “I’m not going to let you swim back to the habitat.”

Rekha met her gaze with a hard one of her own. “Then let me use your seaglide.”

“We’re both going in the moth,” glared back.

“I’m not sitting on your lap for three hours.”

Venjie rolled her eyes. “This is ridiculous. I’m willing to put up with the numb legs to get us both back in a timely manner! Are you suddenly afraid of me now?” She sneered.

“Yes!”

Venjie’s hand jumped away.

“I know!” Anger rose up. “I’m the scary psionic who can turn the world upside down, but you…” Rekha shook her head. “I can’t defend myself against how you make me feel. Three hours trapped in that tiny moth with no space between us, it’ll drive me mad.”

Emotions swirled in lovely amber eyes. Lashes dipped and sparkled in the sunlight. Rekha’s heart leapt into her throat as the sunlight made the amber glow again.

“Okay, Rekha. I’ll follow behind you. But only until we get to a kelp forest, and we can rig you a tow harness.” Venjie held up the seaglide. “Do your tanks need to recharge first?”

Numb, she accepted the glide and nodded.

“I’ll go radio Alandris that we’ll be on our way in a couple hours.” She turned and waded into the water, slipped under to enter the moth.

Rekha stared after. Birdfish swooped in front of her, brought her gaze to gathering storm clouds. An evening storm was brewing. Damn. How long had it been since she’d been on the surface long enough to endure a storm? Or watch the sun set?

What would it be like to sit and watch a sunset with Venjie? A Venjie who wasn’t afraid of her? Who might cuddle close and sigh against her shoulder as the stars came out? Who wouldn’t hurt so damn much to care about?

She turned away from the view and set her air tanks against a tree, made sure the refill switch was turned on. Might as well get some stretching in. Sandy footsteps approached, and she stoutly did not look in their direction. She did use psi to pick up a crab. Angrily, she slammed it into a rock. Its shell cracked and juicy insides oozed out. A shocked gasp came from behind her. Senseless murder wasn’t like Rekha. Crabs normally enjoyed a fairly tame toss if they weren’t on the menu. She looked away from the carcass.

How about upper body exercises. She imagined some intense cramping later from being tugged behind a glide for hours. Silent company began a similar routine. Nope. Too close. Rekha decided it was time for a run. Once they’d expanded the base she’d had long corridors to run in, but it wasn’t the same as doing it outside, under the blazing sun. She found the path that went uphill.

Her legs and lungs were burning by the time she reached the strange alien arch hidden in a cave near the peak. Alandris and Venjie had both talked about it. Rekha was as clueless as them about its purpose or how to activate it. Some sort of religious setup? Venjie had thought it looked like a phasegate. Where would it lead?

Chittering warned her of incoming crabs. How many could there possibly be on this island? Psi picked one up and carried it with her out to the path. She carefully bent at the edge, where the sharp cliff went right to the water. The crab made a tiny splash. Its friends followed.

Her air tanks’ gauges were nearly full when she returned. She stretched and sat in the shade to guzzle water. She was pulling out dried kelp to eat when her feet complained. There was blood on the sand. Cuts on her feet. Dammit. Shouldn’t have run in bare feet. She scowled. Should have thought to bring her shoes.

Irritated, she washed her feet in the surf, inspected them for any real damage. Nothing too serious. “Ow!” she hissed at a shock of pain. There was something embedded.

“Are you hurt?” Softly asked, the question was almost unheard.

“Nothing serious.”

She couldn’t seem to twist right to see what was in her foot.

“Do you need help?”

“No.”

A thorn? No. Nothing here had thorns. Maybe a piece of crab shell. Tiny.

“Rekha.”

She tried closing her eyes and probing with psi. Ah. There. Little triangle of something. She pulled it out, held it to her eyes, still couldn’t tell what it had been. It didn’t even make a splash.

“There’s blood.” Venjie worried. “Rekha, you…”

A fin cut through the water. Some sort of shark coming to investigate. She pushed it away. The medkit in her d-pocket was retrieved, sealant sprayed over her injured soles. She bit her lip at the hiss of pain.

“My tanks should be full by now.” Rekha announced, not looking in Venjie’s direction as she rose. Her feet shrieked their complaints. “I’m going to eat then go.”

There was a long sigh.

She returned to the shade and her tanks, ate the kelp, then some cured fish. More water. Her feet were starting to throb. Her limbs remained weak from exhaustion and stress. What energy she’d had, she’d used up in her desperate run. She could use a nap. Maybe a few hours in the moth with Venjie wouldn’t be  _ that bad _ .

Venjie was awkwardly standing a feet meters away, gazing at the ocean. Her wet hair glimmered in the sunlight. What would it be like to tangle fingers in that hair? How w-

No. Not getting in the moth. Not sitting in Venjie’s lap for three and a half excruciating hours. Rekha rolled her shoulders. She’d rather endure the longer trip by seaglide.

Tanks were shrugged into place. Fins were tugged on despite her feet’s loud complaints. Mask sealed fine, gauges checked out, air flowed well. She slapped her way to the water, nodded at Venjie when she turned, and turned the glide on.

A half hour in, her hands ached. By the end of the hour, they were cramping rather painfully, and she had to stop. Venjie pulled alongside. She gestured with concern.

Rekha shook her head. She stretched and flexed her hands, rotated her shoulders and neck, wished she was anywhere except this planet. Only a couple hours to a kelp forest. Then it would be a short trip in a harness.

She barely got another ten minutes before stopping once more. Her hands were screaming and twitching, slipping from their grip on the glide. Rekha glanced at Venjie in her moth. She eyed her hands. They trembled. The kelp forest was at least another hour away by glide. Dammit.

The hatch on the moth opened. Venjie stared at her.

Dammit! If she could propel herself with psi, she’d do that until she dropped from exhaustion before climbing into Venjie’s lap! She shoved the glide away and started swimming. The moth darted into her path. Venjie gestured angrily. Rekha tried to go around, yet Venjie blocked her. Psi moved the moth out of her way. It was a feat she’d never be able to do out of water -too much mass- even this was a ton of effort, yet she reveled in the shocked expression on Venjie. Absolutely worth the pinnacle headache it caused.

Half an hour later, she was barely a kilometer closer to base. Light, this would take her til morning! Her shoulders and legs burned. Shouldn’t have gone on that run. She floated and stared at the elusive beacon proclaiming how far home still was. Above her, a giant reefback groaned its way through the water. Below her, Venjie’s seamoth waited. Venjie didn’t look at her.

Dammit.

Rekha started the awkward process of removing her fins. Sharp pain assaulted her, and it was more difficult than ever. Had her feet swollen? Alandris was going to rip her a new hole when saw what Rekha had done to herself.

She rapped on the seamoth’s hull. Venjie looked up, expression hard, eyes dark. The hatch opened, and she watched Rekha remove her tanks. Rekha slid into the moth. Venjie’s hands guided her, then settled on her thighs. No tight hug this time. Rekha’s heart bumbled, in disappointment, in hope, for the simple act of touching Venjie.

Her mask was stowed and she set the moth on a course for home. The trip was as awkward and emotionally challenging as she had expected. She was ultra exhausted by the time the magnetic arms brought the moth into the moonpool.

Alandris was waiting, the smell of cooked food a welcome bubble around her. Worried eyes roamed over both. They softened a mote after their inspection. “I’m glad you two made it back safely. Get cleaned up. Dinner will be ready soon.”

Rekha and Venjie went to the hygiene closet, took silent turns, then Venjie stopped Rekha from climbing the ladder up to the bedroom. “I’ll toss you down your clothes.” She gave a meaningful look at her angry red feet.

Rekha nodded.

Clothes were dropped to her. She took them to the closet, stripped, rinsed off with a little fresh water, and got dressed. Her suit was hung to dry. It could wait to be cleaned. She gingerly padded her way to the common room, had to check if she was leaving a trail of blood, because it hurt that much. Strange that she wasn’t.

“What did you do to your feet?” The doctor demanded as soon as she saw Rekha limp in.

From where she was already sitting at the table, Venjie frowned.

“I went for a run while my tanks refilled.”

Alandris’ brow tightened. “You ridiculous, idiotic bulkhead! You could have been back hours ago  _ and _ avoided hurting yourself if you’d gotten in the seamoth to start with! Sit down and let me take a look.”

Her inspection wasn’t as gentle as it could have been. Rekha winced. “I pulled out a shard and washed them in the water.”

“There’s sand in them. We’ll have to scrub off the sealant and clean these better. This one looks particularly deep.” Alandris said. Her tone was hard. “Seriously, what were you thinking?”

“I was upset. I needed the exercise.”

In her peripheral, she saw Venjie’s mouth tighten. Alandris’ irritation took on a note of worry. She glanced at Venjie, back to Rekha. She sighed and rose, washed her hands. “Let’s eat.”

Alandris had put together a soup. It was thick, pleasantly creamy, and hot. Rekha’s exhausted body crooned at the warmth that filled her belly. She summoned the energy to compliment. “This is nice.”

“Thank you.” Alandris smiled. “I had a stroke of genius and finished that blender you were working on.”

Rekha nodded her appreciation.

“The texture is a good change.” Venjie said quietly.

Alandris beamed and waited a while before addressing another topic. “What were you doing in that trench, Venjie? Anything in particular?”

Venjie nodded. “Yes. I’d remembered seeing a particularly deep chasm, and I was investigating. I got in a few scans before the reaper showed up. There’s a tunnel. It goes deep. Maybe deep enough.”

Deep dark tunnel a hundred meters under water, all tight spaces and new horrors? Rekha shuddered and set her spoon down, appetite spoiled.

“Find a bone in the soup?” Alandris asked.

“No.”

She frowned.

Rekha made little ripples in the bowl. She managed to bring another spoonful to her lips.

“Alandris, have you ever noticed how quiet Rekha gets when she has to go somewhere or do something that involves small, dark spaces?”

Alandris hummed. “Now that you mention it. Yes.”

She forced another spoonful down.

“Just mentioning the tunnel makes her uncomfortable.” Venjie said. “A tunnel big enough to fit this entire hab in.”

Rekha ground her teeth. Why did Venjie feel the need to talk about her like this?

Venjie’s fingers drummed on the table. “So why did she go to that wreck by herself?”

“I think I remember hearing you say how scared you were to go in yourself.” Alandris said.

“Oh.”

Heavy silence followed that.

Rekha sucked down the last of her soup. “Thank you for dinner, Alandris.” She stood and ignored the roar of pain in her feet. Almost, she swayed and limped heavily as she took her dish to the wash bin. “I’m going to clean my injuries.”

She felt Venjie’s eyes until she passed through the doorway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! So many chapters in one day. I hope to get more out soon, but life... is life. Someone make Below Zero a finished game, would you? I realllllly wanna play a full game!


	11. Stubborn and Childish

“You might be the most blunt person I’ve ever met.” Venjie mentioned as Rekha was busy taking inventory on what was still needed for the cyclops. Yesterday’s drama had set them back too much. She had to catch up today.

“What's the point in being coy? If I don't need to say it, I don't. If I do, people know what I want and where I stand.” Rekha grumped. “I wish more people would do me the same courtesy.”

Venjie stared at her, a long, studious motion that had Rekha squirming.

“What?”

“I’m not sure I’m brave enough to be that blunt.”

Rekha shrugged. “Then you’ll be left wondering what if.” She rose on sore feet. “I need to get to work. We’re still short a few materials for the cyclops.”

Lithium. They were always short on lithium. Titanium was easy, with wreckage everywhere, though rather tiresome. Cutting salvage into transportable pieces, hauling it, dragging it to the fabricator, then slowly feeding it into their not-industrial-sized equipment took hours. The rarer mineral could only be found at depths greater than 200m. And megafauna tended to roam near the richest deposits.

Sure, Rekha could kill the reapers now, could push away the smaller pests, could probably defend against the warpers. That required being alert and ready while someone else did the drilling with the prawn. She wasn’t sure if it was okay to ask Venjie for help.

“Lithium mining?” Venjie asked.

“Yes.”

“I’ll come with you.”

She eyed Venjie. Moments like these made Rekha wonder if Venjie was telepathic and had been reading her thoughts. Not possible. But still… “I thought you had other projects planned today.”

“Building the cyclops takes priority, and mining is a two-person job.”

“Okay,” she acceded. “I’ll be ready within the hour. I’ll take first shift in the moth.” It was easier to jump out of, and she could survey the area better. She could scare away the predators for a while. Reapers might show up when she was in the prawn, and she’d be too focused on her work to notice. Venjie might not either until it was too late and…

“It’ll go much faster if I do all the mining while you keep the predators away. We’ll just burn up a couple power cells if I’m using the moth’s defense for it,” was said so matter-of-factly that it was hard to believe it was Venjie speaking. Was this the same woman who hated Rekha for simply existing?

Slapping a beat against her ribs, her heart tried to make a big deal out of it. Nonsense. Venjie was also a practical engineer. Her no-nonsense tone said she was making the best of the situation and using the resources at hand. If there was anything to hope for, it was that Venjie would treat Rekha like she used to, a good -if annoying- crewmate.

“It will go faster.” Rekha agreed.

There wasn’t a debate on location. The best lode for lithium hadn’t been drained yet. Unfortunately, it was in the same bulb zone where Rekha’s pod had sunk. She spent the entire trek there gathering her courage, then feeling left down when there wasn’t a reaper to greet them. In fact, the whole area seemed like a child’s playground with the floaty bulbs and fluorescent colors. Not scary at all.

With that thought, her mind drifted to the other bulb zone near Venjie’s tunnel. The one where the bulbs were big purple fungus-like things that grew up from thick stalks. Scanners said they were edible. The spoiled-milk taste said they weren’t.

They needed to give these places proper names. Their PDAs were adding data to the map that Alandris had begun to compile. They could give these distinct biomes names. This small zone could be Bulb Zone A, because it was the first they had run into. And the larger one with the spoiled-milk flavored fungi could be Bulb Zone B. There was the Safe Shallows where Venjie had had the luck to crash land, the Crash Zone that still pulsed with radiation though Venjie had plugged up the leaks in the drive core, Red Grass Zone, Mushroom Forests A and B, and…

Rekha shouldn’t be in charge of naming things. Creativity in her hands was wasted outside of machines. Light, she missed the simple days of fixing exosuits, sometimes helping other departments with their maintenance workloads, and not worrying about shelter, food, clean water, what was going to attack her next, or if her only friends might die of an alien disease.

Shame at getting distracted had her sitting up and doing an area scan. No sharks, they’d all… gone into hiding? What? She broadened her search, discovered a reaper. Was it the same as that first one? Irritation, instead of fear, was her first reaction.  _ Go away _ , she grouched at it. Not that it had the capacity to understand, but it felt good to vent.  _ I’m tired of fending you monsters off. _

Its movements stalled.

_ You don’t need to investigate. Go away, and I won’t have to hurt you. _

The creature spun around and sprinted out of her range. Had it… had it understood? She’d intended to use suggestion as she did with sharks, not words. Or was it only a basic understanding of cause and effect? It recognized her mental voice and associated it with pain? How did it know what direction to flee in?

“Rekha?” Venjie’s voice over the comm had her jumping in surprise. “I’m taking a break.”

She coughed, did another quick scan that found the reaper still in fast retreat. Ultra strange. “I read you. It’s clear if you want to stretch your legs. I’m going to.” She slid gear on, struggled with her fins and sore feet, and popped the hatch open. Dense, cold water greeted her. She shivered at the sensation of being trapped and forced herself into a swim to combat it.

Twenty minutes were spent building up a sweat. She let herself sink to the top of a green bulb. The things were actually floating gas sacks held down by vines. Midday, even at 300 meters, the water wasn’t dark, yet the bulb glowed under her butt. What was the purpose? Why did most everything down here glow? Maybe she should have studied botany. Oh well. She shook her head, settled on being thankful that there was light to drive back the terrifying darkness. Mining in the dark was at the bottom of her list of things to do.

She decided it was time to get back in the moth. Needed to unload first. She signaled to Venjie, then ascended to depth safe enough to open her suit and assume the position. Why couldn’t moths have a hygiene seat? Cold water and pressure assaulted her, nearly plugged her up from the shock. She managed to keep control and release. Fish swarmed the solid waste. Disgusting. She swam a meter away, kicked at fish that followed. 

Hopefully, Venjie didn’t notice the swarming creatures and put two and two together. It was embarrassing to not have an ounce of privacy. Stupid backwater planet! Still complaining, she cleaned up, pulled her suit back on, and entered her moth.

Venjie returned a few minutes later, and they went back to work. The remainder of her shift was quiet. A hefty sum of lithium was acquired, and they cheered when the PDAs agreed that it was enough to build the cyclops. A good spot was chosen for the mobile bay to fabricate the large vehicle and set to do its job. Its little drones whirred into action. Twenty minutes of watching them fabricate the nose of the frame, Rekha grew bored and started on the evening meal. The drones would take almost thirty hours to finish. There was a whole freighter worth of work she could do in the meantime, like gather materials for the upgrades.

 

Thirty hours later, they stepped inside to find the sub’s interior was more cramped than a bar on New Years. With dimensions of 54 by 14 by 12 meters, it wasn’t small, yet most of the interior was filled with the engine and a vehicle docking bay. The lower level was mostly storage and walkway. With a docked prawn, the lower level was effectively cut in half.

Its single hygiene facility was little more than a cramped closet located in the lower level. There was a tiny area between control room and vehicle access that they dedicated for sleeping. While Venjie and Rekha returned to the habitat to prep plants and materials for transfer to cyclops, they left Alandris to fill the cyclops with furniture.

When they came back with their first load, Rekhat thought that Alandris had done a fine job with the limited space. A great job fitting essentials like some work space, chairs, and needed equipment. Not such a great job with the bed situation.

“There’s only two beds here.” Venjie noted. One a single, the other double.

Alandris shrugged. “No idea how to reprogram the builder to make bunks anchored to the wall. We can’t afford to give up garden space for a third bed. Best I could do. Being the senior crew here, I’ve claimed the single. You two get the double until Rekha can figure out a design change.”

“I don’t have time for that kind of work.” Rekha argued.

“You can’t be serious,” Venjie complained at the same time.

“I’m taking the single.” Alandris repeated.

Horror shifted Venjie’s features, and hurt stabbed hard in Rekha’s chest.

“This isn’t one of the ways I imagined getting you into my bed,” Rekha leered, “But I’ll take it.”

Disbelief gaped at her. “Do you ever think of anything else?”

“Different techniques I’d use on you.”

Venjie threw her hands up and stomped to the ladder, slid down and started angrily transferring items into storage. A minute later, the hatch slammed with her exit.

“Do you do that on purpose or is it a reflex?” Alandris questioned.

Anger puffed. How dare she? This was her fault!

“If it helps, I am sorry about the bed situation.”

“If you were sorry, you’d have announced that one of us could have the single bed.” Rekha sniped. 

Steady and calm, Alandris stared back at her. “Because the healthy ones should have to share a bed with the dying woman? Neither of you are sick. I’d like to keep it that way.”

 Fury died, tears threatening to replace it. Dammit!

Crying was useless. Get to work. Pocketing her emotions, she went back to transporting supplies aboard the cyclops. Talk during dinner was stilted. It consisted only of what was left to be done and how early they would leave in the morning. Nothing was said after. Chores were finished quickly, and the crew silently found their individual beds. Rekha tried to enjoy the privacy and space as best she could. She probably wouldn’t experience it again for a long while.

 

Rekha was awake before the morning alarm. She hadn’t managed to get more than a couple hours sleep and rose when she grew sick of staring at the ceiling. Breakfast was put together for the crew. She performed a last walkthrough of the habitat, triple checking that everything was in low-power quiet mode, that bulkhead doors were sealed. It could be weeks before they came back.

If at all.

She fabbed extra rolls of rubber and mesh before the others rose, took the blankets off her bed after they vacated the room, and mentally prepared herself to sleep on the floor of the cyclops. The morning’s meal was as uncomfortable as dinner. Rekha reported her diligence and announced that she would wait for them aboard the cyclops.

Course already set, all she had to do was warm up the engines and perform pre-launch checks. “Welcome aboard, captain.” She greeted Alandris with a mock salute.

It’d been intended as humor. Darkened eyes said it shifted Alandris’ mind to the fact that with the deaths of everyone else, she essentially was acting captain.

Grief lowered her head and her tone. “I’m sorry, Alandris. I meant it as a joke.”

Alandris sighed and touched Rekha’s shoulder. “I know.” She mustered a smile. “But if I have to be acting captain, then I get the good chair.”

Rekha nodded. “Of course, captain ma’am.”

Alandris chuckled and made her way to the ship’s diagnostics station. The chair’s cushioning hissed slightly as it accepted her weight.

Without speaking or meeting Rekha’s eye, Venjie went to the station on the opposite wall and looked over the engine’s readouts. “Pre-launch checks complete?”

“Yes, Remus.”

“Engine readouts are green.”

Rekha looked at Alandris.

“Diagnostics read green. Take us out, pilot.” Alandris waved grandly.

Pilot. The one who got to stand all day on feet that still hadn’t finished healing. The one who got to deal with the pressure of not crashing into anything or letting a reaper hear them or…

“Engine powering up.” The ship’s voice intoned. Light, that was the worst voice any programmer had ever come up with. Deep, unnervingly so, with a gutteral undertone that served no purpose except to remind her that the voice was digitally generated. Stupid Alterrans.

Vibration hummed through her aching feet as the engine wound up.

“Ahead standard.” It announced in its awful baritone.

When they stopped, she was going to look into changing the ship’s voice.

Half an eye on the sonar readouts, half checking every direction that the front glass bubble allowed, half on the three cameras she could flip through, and a psi probe constantly scanning for leviathans, Rekha guided the cyclops. As planned, she aimed them for an area that Venjie hadn’t explored despite its closeness. Sonar said the dropoff was 100 meters nearly straight down into darkness.

Forty meters down, and creepy plant arms came into view. They spread out radially from a central stalk and glowed a disconcerting white. As the ship passed, the arms suddenly moved, curling inwards towards a pinkish center. It looked like a mouth.

Predator plants now?

Shivering, she eyed the stalk as it thickened from a few centimeters to nearly a meter with blood-red pustules.

“Blood kelp.” Venjie breathed. “These things are in the trench near the floating island. I investigated long enough to harvest the oil for benzene. It was the most frightening place I’ve been on this awful planet. Although, if I’d come down here in just a moth, this would take the cake.” They began to see more blood kelp in the distance, a small forest taking shape. Ghostly fish darted among them. “Scanner thinks those moving arms are gathering microorganisms for energy. And anything else small or dumb enough to enter the mouth. Creepiest plants I…”

“This ecological biome matches seven of the nine preconditions for stimulating terror in humans.” Venjie’s PDA announced. It refused to not be obnoxious, no matter how much it was tinkered with.

“Yes. Thank you.” Venjie muttered. “I hadn’t noticed.”

Another ten meters and a squid-like creature floated in her vision. A predator, judging by its simple thoughts.

“No!” Venjie cried out. “Get us out of here!”

Startled, Rekha jerked the steering wheel. The cyclops creaked its protest. “What? Why?”

“Those things emit EMPs,” was growled. “They can shut the engine down!”

“They what?” hissed out of Rekha even as she pulled the wheel back for immediate ascent. The gauge spun numbers satisfying quickly. Her ears popped.

“Electro-magnetic-pulse.” Alandris smoothed her hair as the cyclops leveled out. “From a damn fish. Fantastic. Obviously, this pit is going to the bottom of the list of places to explore. Take us to Venjie’s tunnel.”

Without burning up the engine, they didn’t get there until after lunch. The tunnel mouth had to be five times the length of the cyclops. Bonesharks made quick movements away from the large vehicle. Their instincts thought it was a larger predator, like the reapers that fed on them. Good, because she didn’t want to test the defensive shield. Schematics said it sucked up energy like a parasite.

With no easy way to recharge the power cells, they had to be careful how quickly they used up what they had. The dozen spares in the lockers felt like a lot. They also didn’t feel like nearly enough for this adventure. Plans had been made for that problem, but taking the time to build a nuclear reactor and a habitat for it simply to charge power cells wasn’t what they wanted to do.

Rekha slowed the sub. She scanned ahead for leviathans. Nothing near. There was something down deep. Multiple somethings. Too much rock in the way to get a good read though. Three hours of creeping down the tunnel had revealed some mineral deposits, black smokers that emitted volcanic gasses and excessive heat, and the occasional boneshark.

“Five hundred meters.” Alandris spoke with awe and frustration. “Five hundred, and this tunnel doesn’t seem like it ends. I don’t know about you two, but I’m stressed and need a break. Rekha, put us closer to the wall and shut the engine down.”

“Aye, captain,” came out reflexively.

Alandris made a noise, yet didn’t comment.

“Engine powering down.” The ship announced.

Definitely have to do something about that voice! She peeled cramped hands off the wheel. Alandris had them visit the head, then do exercises for an hour to burn off stress and anxiety. Mostly, they did laps through the ship. Climb down the ladder from the control room, run between lockers, duck under the docked prawn’s legs, climb up the ladder by the engine’s turbine, dodge the plants that took up most of the free space on deck, pass between the beds, through the hatch into the control room and repeat. Some jumping jacks and lunges were included for fun. Rekha’s swollen feet throbbed in agony. Was Alandris still punishing her?

They washed, hung their clothes to dry, and changed into the loose dresses that Venjie had cut and welded from extra blankets. What a luxury to have something aside from tattered clothes and diving suits to wear. Her dress wasn’t silk or even soft cotton, yet it still made her feel like a queen. Almost made up for not having a kitchen anymore. 

Dinner conversation was mostly how much deeper the tunnel could possibly go. After, they put themselves as far from each other as they could get. Alandris down below. Venjie the engine compartment. Rekha the control room.

She quickly didn’t want to be looking out the viewport into the darkness and moved to the garden. What was left of usable space on deck was full of plants. Mature plants had been painstakingly stuffed into pots and transported to the cyclops. The leaves of the lantern trees scraped along the low ceiling, despite branches hanging low with fruit. Melons and potatoes filled the spaces between. One bulbo tree. Two ferns. The density of plant life made her smile, almost forget how deep below the surface she was.

Rekha yawned. Might as well sleep. She unrolled rubber and mesh between pots and wrapped up in blankets. Her eyes closed, and she plunged into dreams.

“Why am I not surprised?” a low voice whispered.

“You aren’t?” a second questioned.

“You really didn’t take her lechery seriously, did you?”

“But she…”

Who? What was happening?

_ You’re closer. _ A warm, tired presence touched her mind.  _ Good. _ It faded.

_ Who? _ But it was already gone.

“She is painfully aware of boundaries.”

Someone sighed. “I know.”

Fluttering awareness put labels on the voices. Venjie and Alandris. They must be heading to bed. Sleep was good. She started to sink back into it.

“Rekha?”

Mm. No.

“Rekha, you don’t have to sleep on the floor.” Venjie’s voice. “I’m sorry I got upset earlier. It was unfair of me. Rekha, please open your eyes. I need you to hear me.”

Unhappily, she struggled through the soup of sleep to open an eye.

Venjie was kneeling and her expression was soft. “Hey. The bed is perfectly big enough to share. I apologize for earlier. I know you respect boundaries. Unless you feel more comfortable here, please come to bed.”

Go to bed with Venjie? Oh no. No. No. No. She wanted that too much. “I’m fine.” She ignored how aware she suddenly was that her thin mat wasn’t enough to be comfortable or to adequately keep her insulated. Stubbornly, she closed her eyes.

“I remember how uncomfortable our mats were on the island, Rekha.” Alandris stated. “That one is even thinner. It can’t possibly be keeping you warm either. A chilled body is going to be more susceptible to sickness. We can’t afford that down here, and you know it.”

Anger flushed through her, banishing the shiver that had been developing.

“Alandris. That isn’t necessary.” Venjie objected.

“Are you warm enough, Rekha?”

“I said I’m fine.” She managed to growl.

“We can’t afford the energy cost of keeping the sub warmer.” The doctor refused to back down. “I can feel the cold of the deck through my shoes. We’ll put your mat to good use by folding it up and giving your feet relief at the pilot station. Stop being prideful and get up.”

Hot and indignant, Rekha jumped to her feet and got in Alandris’ face. “For an old Martian war vet, you seem to lack a basic sense of self-preservation,” was spit out in her best scary voice. “Or you wouldn’t make it such a hobby to push my buttons!” Plants rustled in a conjured theatrical wind.

Venjie took a gasping backwards step.

Unimpressed, Alandris leaned forward. Their noses almost touched. “Maybe you shouldn’t have made such an effort at proving how gentle and non-threatening you actually are.”

She sputtered.

“Pick up your blankets and get to bed, little girl.” Alandris pointed over her shoulder.

The urge to stomp her foot and scream swept through her. It made her want to laugh. Fine. She’d obey  _ and _ have her tantrum. She focused every spark of psi strength she had to pick Alandris up.

“Rekha!” shrieked out. “Put me down!”

She did. Half a meter to the side. A lantern tree was grabbed by panicked hands. Grinning, she let psi sweep up her blankets, fly them across the deck, spread, and arrange them on the beds. One for each.

“Gods take your light, you insufferable child.” Alandris barked behind her.

“Good dreams, old woman.” Rekha cut a dramatic bow and strode to the larger bed. Psi lifted the covers, allowed her to slip toward the edge facing the wall. She laid on her side and closed her eyes.

Irritated muttering followed her.

“She did that to me too.” Venjie whispered.

“What?”

“When we were coming back from the weapon platform and I tried to stop her from swimming. She moved the entire moth!”

Their movements paused. “She is obscenely stubborn and childish.”

“Yes.” Venjie groaned.

Alandris hummed. “She’s also enormously thoughtful. You’ll notice she left the open side to you so you won’t feel trapped.”

“She did?”

“Dream well, Venjie.” Alandris’ footsteps drew close, then fabric rustled, and a groan escaped.

Louder footsteps followed, and Venjie eased into bed. Body heat wafted off her. Rekha struggled not to roll over, to glomp onto that warmth and bury her cold nose in it. She twitched at a quick touch to her shoulder. “Thank you, Rekha.”

She shrugged. “Good dreams.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fluff :)


	12. Push Forward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> may the beginning of the holiday season not destroy you <3 may it be filled with good food and good company

Rekha woke, deliciously warm, happily ready to lie there the whole day enjoying the heat source pressed along her back. She stretched lazily. Her heat source moved.

What?

Psi inspected the other side of her bed, discovered a body. Who had she shared her bed with? Quan again? She was always up for a roll.

Not Quan. Too tall. Wider shoulders.

Brain chugging away, Rekha opened her eyes. The dim lighting gave her a blank wall. Too close. Psi reached further into the room. Another bed with a body. Only one. Her two other roommates were absent, as was the rest of their quarters. Water was beyond the wall at Rekha’s nose.

Oh.

Quan was gone. The  _ Aurora _ was a smoldering heap. Rekha was hundreds of meters below the surface of the worst planet in the galaxy, and the person she was sharing her bed with made her heart ache. The wall was too close. Venjie was too close. She couldn't breathe, had to get out. She went to throw off the covers and leap out and guilt stopped her. Venjie deserved her rest, didn't need to be woken up by a panicking bulkhead.

She could find a way to get up without waking Venjie. Right? The bed’s edge was flush with the wall. No room there. Or… Her hand touched the awkward protrusion of the platform beneath the mattress. She’d always hated it before, but it could be useful here. Blankets were pushed off and tucked around Venjie. The foamlike mattress didn’t express much movement and rising to her feet didn’t rouse her bedmate. She stepped over Venjie, found the protruding platform with her toes and escaped the bed.

A yelp escaped as abused, bare feet touched frigid deck. She hustled her shoes and ship uniform from the locker. Light! She missed slippers. Her shoes had been old aboard the  _ Aurora _ . Down here, the need to replace them was more prominent than ever. The soles were awfully thin. Something else on the ever-growing list of things she needed to figure out how to create. Once she had time.

She visited the hygiene closet and washed her face. No chores to do. No sunrise to watch. No fish to scare away. She checked the cyclops’ readouts. Nothing interesting. Loud exercise was out of the question until the others rose. Quiet stretching then. Between the lantern trees, she began an old stretching routine that her parents had taught her.

It was ancient, to be honest. And it was about strength as much as stretching. She warmed quickly and moved into a handstand, a single hand. The sounds of people rising reached her. Smoothly, she switched hands.

“Delhian exercises?” Alandris asked.

“These movements are older than the trans-gov.” Rekha folded her legs back to touch her head. Almost touch. An old injury kept her too stiff to complete the movement. “Predates space travel altogether by millenia.”

“What does?” Venjie entered. “W-whoa,” she stuttered.

Legs returned straight up, then split in opposite directions. “It’s called yoga.”

“Is this how you got up without waking me?” Venjie asked softly.

“No. I can fly as well.”

“Wha-” coughed out. “Rekha!”

Giggles escaped her. “I wish I could self-propel.” Exchange leg direction. “Can you imagine how much fun that would be?”

“You’re in a fine mood today.” Alandris poked a foot at her.

Rekha straightened her legs, folded forward, and rolled to her toes. “We’re getting close to the disease facility.”

Hesitant hope clouded Alandris’ tone. “Rekha. The fact that we’re deeper doesn’t n-”

“She told me.”

Expression twisting, “Who?”

Rekha bent backward until her hands were flat on the rubber mat and her body was arched. “The voice. She’s powerful. I can’t sense her until she makes contact.”

“Voice?” worry pitched Alandris’ voice low.

“I’m not going mad.” Rekha said. “I’ve heard her voice several times. The first time, I did think I was imagining it. But she’s contacted me a few times, just quick statements or questions, but she’s definitely real. She’s definitely not human.”

Her new position let her watch her crewmates’ faces. There was disbelief, fear, and confusion. “Why didn’t you say anything before?”

“Even if you had believed me, there wasn’t anything you could do with the information.” Rekha would have shrugged if she could. “Whoever she is, she sounds old, tired, and eager to help. I wonder if she’s a native or from the species that built the weapon platform.”

Venjie sat down. “I don’t know how I’d feel about meeting a precursor.”

Alandris crossed her arms. “It’s probably for the best that the only weapons we have are knives and laser cutters. I’m calm now, but facing a creator of the weapon that killed almost everyone I know and care about…”

Venjie nodded.

“You said the voice is powerful, but old? Could she overpower you?” The old soldier asked.

“If she has battle capability, yes. Absolutely. She could contact me on the surface from however deep she is, but I couldn’t even sense her, still can’t sense her.”

“Why do you sound so relieved about this?” Venjie gaped.

Sound relieved? Did she? Rekha slipped into a sitting position. “Because if she truly wants to help and isn’t trying to pull us into a trap, then I won’t be the only psionic on this planet. It’s been so long since…” She frowned, unwilling to go down that vulnerable path. “It would be a nice change.” She put her feet back under her. “I’ll go start breakfast.”

Silence filled in the space she left. It followed her all two meters to the other side of the deck where they had a fabricator, counter, hot plate, and a locker of ingredients. She tried to dispel it with clattering and chopping. The noise of Alandris and Venjie beginning their own morning exercises almost did.

The sound of Rekha’s mom chattering about herbs or her father singing as he stirred vegetables would have finished pushing out the silence. So would a cousin’s telepathic teasing. Or the wind playing with leaves. Or music from a crewmate’s homemade speakers that violated half a dozen ship rules that the XO turned a blind eye to. Or air rushing past her face as she explored a new city on her homemade hoverbike.

Sharp pain yanked her from reverie. Her knife had slipped, bitten deep into her finger. Rekha swore angrily and spent the next ten minutes roughly sterilizing and sealing the injury. Alandris raised a brow at it when Rekha served the meal, but otherwise it was another quiet repast.

They were at their stations by 0900. Rekha pushed aside her daydreams to focus on the task at hand. Her world boiled down to her forward view and the camera feeds. An hour in, and she brought the cyclops to a screeching halt.

“What happened?” Alandris demanded.

“Come look.” Rekha stepped back to wave at the newest horror story on the camera feeds. Alandris stalked up to gasp and slap a hand to the wall for support. Venjie reacted similarly.

On the camera feed were giant bones that could only be a reaper. Its skeleton was scattered. The bones were damaged by what looked like teeth, teeth the size of the reaper’s head. A few meters away was another skeleton, nearly complete, also with gigantic teeth marks. Whatever had killed the reapers was bigger than the cyclops. Significantly bigger.

“What in the galaxy is big enough to eat a reaper?” hissed Venjie.

Rekha reached into the deep, trembling at the gargantuan life she felt down there.

“Rekha?” Venjie prodded.

She swallowed against her fear-dry throat. “Whatever eats them lives in the deep.”

“And that’s where we’re heading.” Alandris wiped her face. “The two of y-”

“Might contract the Kharaa too.” Rekha cut in. “We have to keep going.”

Alandris stared for a long minute before shaking her head and waving forward. She sniffled, sighed. “Okay, pilot, take us further in.”

“Aye, captain.” Light, she didn’t want to, but there wasn’t another way. 

It was the lighting’s gradual change that Rekha noticed first. The plantlife was changing, its bioluminescence more blues and reds than the previous greens and yellows. A white shark darting away from the cyclops’ lamps was the next. The next white shark, she realized that it wasn’t white. It was transparent, the bones glowing a ghastly white in the unnerving blue underworld.

“Are its insides glowing too?” Venji whispered.

“I think it has luminescence in its skin. Its internal organs are being lit up by that.” Alandris whispered back.

“How does…” Venjie trailed off at the deep blackness swallowing the world.

Flecks of light darted through it, but it was huge. Sensors couldn’t find the edges. “It’s a cavern.” Rekha found her voice. As though her voice summoned it, a spine-rattling shriek came out of the darkness.

“Rekha?”

She didn’t want to reach out, didn’t want to find whatever was attached to that banshee's song.

“Rekha, what is it?”

Her hands acted of their own accord, letting the cyclops slow to a stop, putting the engines on silent-running mode, and cutting the lamps. She stared into the darkness.

“Rekha!” echoed through the cyclops.

She jumped, whirled, found Alandris and Venjie staring at her. The red lighting of the silent-running mode cast deep shadows across their faces, fear etched in every line. It grounded her. She reached out, found the monster, was surprised that it seemed about the size of a reaper. Whatever monstrosity she’d sensed earlier wasn’t in this cavern. She sighed in relief and reported what she’d discovered.

“It could still cause us a lot of trouble. Keep us away from it.” Alandris said grimly. “Try to follow a wall.”

“Aye.” Rekha agreed. She turned back and found that without the lamps, the water was a lurid green, plants and fungi glowed in clusters near black smokers, along the walls, over an uneven, murky, seafloor. Dots of light glowed in the distance. Flickers of white, green, and blue darted among black smokers and fungal growths.

She flicked on the lamps, and the nightmarescape vanished. Lamps off, it came alive. She couldn’t decide which was worse. Flailing through the darkness made her want to cry and keeping the lights off to see didn’t make sense to her brain.

Teeth grit, lamps off, she directed the cyclops along the wall on her right. The shrieks grew louder. Every moment drew them closer. She kept searching for a way to avoid the leviathan. The cavern was massive, a thousand nooks and crannies teasing of exits that remained elusive, if they existed at all. She kept going until strange stalagmites caught her eye. They were sharp and curved, thrusting up from what looked like a lake of green-yellow fog.

“Are those bones?” Alandris’ chair creaked with her rising. She came up beside Rekha. “Can you get us closer?”

Bones? The stalagmites? She drew away from the wall a few meters, didn’t have to get closer to see what Alandris was seeing. They weren’t stalagmites, they were ribs. Humongous ribs, bound by vertebrae the size of prawnsuits, leading up to a towering skull that rivaled their cyclops. Light, she never wanted to see one of these things alive.

“I need scans.” Alandris announced eagerly. “How b-” Coughing racked her body, hard, awful coughing that bent her double, had Rekha jumping to offer support. When the coughs finished, Alandris was left trembling and barely able to stand. Rekha led her back to her chair where she collapsed.

“I’ll get you scans.” Rekha promised. These bones weren't intrinsic to their mission, but they were from a creature they’d never seen before. Maybe they could give Alandris some answers. Maybe they would only satisfy a scientist’s curiosity. Either would make Alandris happier and that was good enough reason for Rekha to investigate.

Temps were within tolerance range. The seaglide was almost at crush depth. She didn’t want the noise it would produce, so she simply checked its readouts in case she needed a speed boost. Battery was good. Motor didn’t need maintenance.

“I’ll watch your back.” Venjie was hefting the stasis rifle, checking its charge. Its blast could hold a reaper immobile for five minutes. Would have been nice to have when Venjie got cornered by the infected one. Stupid thing had been under a pile of materials in a workshop at the time. It was a relief to see now.

“No glides or noise unless necessary.” Rekha said. “We’ll scan a few ribs and the skull, then come back.”

Venjie nodded.

They squeezed into suits, tugged on flippers and gear, and slapped to the hatch. Rekha gave a thumbs up and dove into the water. Breathing was a struggle, the pressure was that intense. It felt somewhere between feeling like she could walk on a hard surface and being crushed under a mountain. Fish immediately came to investigate. A shark followed. She batted it away and when it circled around, she broke one of the boney spines along its back. It howled and dashed into the gloom. There was another shark behind her when she turned, but this one was caught in a stasis field.

Rekha nodded her thanks to Venjie and closed the distance to a rib. While the scanner took its time, she noticed a cluster of black smokers in the middle of the ribs. They no longer spewed superheated gas and sediments into the water, had been cold a long time judging by the smoothed edges and buildup of flora. While active, they’d produced a sizable hill. The bottom sections of several ribs were buried in it.

These bones were old. Extremely old. Maybe they weren’t indicative of something they’d find later. Maybe they were the bones of an extinct species! That would be nice. Her mind brought up the bones of dead reapers. This species might be extinct, yet there was still something alive big enough to eat reapers. There was nothing to celebrate here.

The scanner blipped its completion, and they swam the dozen meters to the skull. A few teeth were still attached. They were longer than Rekha was tall. Two empty eye sockets boasted the same; two others were slightly smaller. Small, translucent, glowing fish darted out when they shone a light in. A shark came to investigate, wasn’t immediately deterred by mental prodding. Psi found its gills and jabbed them until the shark finally swam away.

Turning around, Rekha couldn’t find Venjie. Panic rose until she sensed Venjie inside the skull. The woman hadn’t even noticed the shark; she was too busy examining the skull’s interior with light and scanner. A smile tickled at her cheeks. Venjie trusted her enough to watch her back.

The thought warmed her, distracted her, flew out of her head when a teeth-rattling shriek filled the water. Rekha screamed and flailed, cracked her head against the skull. Dazed, she floated and stared into the murky waters. Lights danced and bobbed all around her. It was kind of pretty, in a horrible, wrong way.

One of the lights seemed to be getting bigger. It was filling the darkness, filling Rekha’s vision. Another ghastly shriek made her head vibrate, cleared the cotton from it, let her see clearly. The leviathan. She grabbed at the ancient skull and swung her body into its cavernous mouth. The leviathan shrieked by, howling at the loss of its interesting new prey. In the darkness, her heart hammered, her breaths came too fast, and she almost screamed again when a soft blue light drew close.

Venjie’s terrified face peered at her from the lit mask. Shaking hands clutched the stasis rifle. Would it work? That thing was definitely a few meters longer than a reaper, thicker body and head too. Instead of vestigial arms or giant, grasping mandibles, it had an elongated skull, two beams sticking out on either side of its face. Its mouth was a giant cavern that could swallow sharks whole. 

Rekha thought that she’d witnessed the most terrifying things this planet had to offer. How was it possible that there were worse things than reapers? The ghostly leviathan shrieked into the nightmare waters. Its glowing, wraithlike form was straight out of a horror vid from Rekha’s teen years. 

Teen years. Something about that teased her thoughts. More shrieks announced that the leviathan was circling back around, investigating the skull. It radiated frustration. When a third pass didn’t produce its prey, its tail whipped angrily, smashing ancients ribs, scaring schools of little fish. How infantile. Reapers didn’t behave like…

Oh light. Was this leviathan a  _ baby _ ?

She peeked out from between barnacle-covered teeth. The leviathan shrieked and attacked a shark, tore it to pieces, smacked the chunks about. Light! It was juvenile! This thing wasn’t fully grown! Terror and panic started to take over. A glance at Venjie’s equally frightened face reminded her that she didn’t have time to be scared.

Okay, the leviathan was a juvenile. Could she use that? Its soft spot should be easier to find and exploit. She balked at the thought of killing, especially of killing a baby, no matter how awful it was. Could she scare it? What in the light would a giant leviathan be scared of? The skull she was in laughed at her. A bigger leviathan. No way to replicate that.

Could she distract it? The chunks of shark were being set upon by small fish. The leviathan was back at the skull, its tail whacked against it, caused another tooth to fall. It suddenly accelerated, turned around, and raced back. The skull cracked under the assault.

Oh no. Rekha tried what she’d done with the shark. She used psi to find its gills and jab at them. The leviathan shrieked and bit at the water. It flicked its giant body about, rubbed its gills against any nearby surface.

Venjie touched her arm, made a questioning gesture. Touch her mind and explain? No. She pantomimed diving down to the seafloor, hiding in the yellow fog, swimming to the cyclops.

Venjie’s response was immediate and negative. She grabbed Rekha’s arm, violently shaking her head. When Rekha didn’t swim down, Venjie let go to produce her PDA, brought up a scan. The yellow fog was corrosively alkaline and denser than the water, which was why it behaved like a fog at the bottom.

The leviathan was coming back. Damn it! Rekha attacked the gills, the eyeballs, only let up with the leviathan swam away. The second it started to return, the attacks renewed. A half hour of that, and the leviathan either forgot about the interesting things in the skull or connected them to pain. It shrieked away to a deep alcove that Rekha hoped they didn’t need to explore later.

Rekha and Venjie slipped out from inside the skull. A shark was there. It opened its jaws. Venjie reacted first, the rifle going off, a bubble of static surrounding the shark, immobilizing it. Fear rebounded in its mind. Venjie took lead, heading toward the cyclops, one hiding spot at a time. She kept glancing back to Rekha, probably wondering about the leviathan or maybe about the nightmare psionic who could scare away giant monsters. That thought added to the burgeoning headache. She pushed it away. No time for self-pity.

Back at the cyclops, Alandris was briefed and given the scans. Eager curiosity burned at the PDA. Alandris shook her head. “As much as we all want to take a break right now. We should move while the leviathan is cowed.”

Rekha left her suit on and went to the pilot station. “On your orders, captain.”

“Keep on, Rekha. Normal speed.”  
“Aye.” She stirred the engine to normal speed and moved forward. Hours were spent exploring the vast cavern, poking into deep recesses, and tensely waiting for the return of the leviathan.

“Lunch break.” Alandris announced around 1300. Rekha powered down the engine after settling them in an alcove. “Venjie, go use the head, then take first watch.”

“Aye.” Venjie nearly jumped down the hatch to the lower level.

“I’ll wait for her return.” Alandris gestured. “Go on.”

Rekha needed to use the hygiene facility too, but went to get a drink instead of waiting outside the door where she would run into Venjie. When she heard Venjie return, she took her turn unloading and washing up. Lunch was tackled after. While potatoes cooked, she tested one of the ghostly fish that Venjie had acquired earlier. They weren’t awful.

Low in calories though. She pawed through the lockers, looking for some interesting way of serving yet another sub-par fish. There was a half-eaten lemon ration bar stowed beside the rendered shark fat. How old was it? It wasn’t molded, but crumbled at her touch. She licked the crumbs off her fingers. A little sugar and fat, and they could be an almost decent dessert topping. Or with spice and fat, a nice, crispy coating to…

Fried fish. Yes! A sprinkle of dehydrated kelp and salt, and the crumbs completely changed. There was enough to lightly coat each slab of fish. They gave off a delightful scent as they fried in the liquefied fat. Her stomach growled appreciatively.

“How are you making something that smells that good?” Alandris rasped as she sat at their little table.

“A stroke of genius.” Rekha grinned as she blended lantern fruit and white sap into a frothy, sweet drink.

“Though I appreciate the effort, it’s a bit much for lunch, isn’t it?” Alandris asked as a plate of fried fish and sliced potatoes were put in front of her. She sucked down a mouthful of drink with a sigh.

“Nonsense. It’s already been an awful day. We could all use the pickmeup.” Rekha replied. “I’ll take Venjie hers while it’s hot.”

Venjie gaped at the delivery. She hissed at the heat, yet shoved a bite of crispy fish into her mouth, and moaned around it. “Incredible.”

Flush with pleasure, Rekha left Venjie to her meal, and went to her own. She held the delicious treat and compliments tight as the day dragged on. A few needed resources were found. Upgrades to the Cyclops depth limits were now possible. They held off fabricating them, hoping that they’d find the facility at this depth, could save the energy and resources for other projects.

Several strange plants were investigated. A bulbous sac that was hard to find in shallow waters sprouted in vast quantities down here. Studying the thing as it pulsed on the wall, Rekha thought to consider if it was edible as well as being useful in advanced construction materials. Scan results said it was.

No one wanted to tempt spoiling their stomachs after Rekha’s beautiful lunch. Taste testing was put off for the next day.

They found the leviathan’s hiding spot. It was right next to a large tunnel a couple dozen meters off the seafloor. Rootlike structures that glowed a soft yellow lined what they could see of the tunnel. A veritable waterfall of toxic fog fell from it. Fish played unconcerned through it, up it, down it.

“Do we keep going?” Rekha whispered after her report. The red light of silent-running made Alandris look sicker than ever.

“The research facility might be down that tunnel.” Venjie said.

“Maybe. But scans show it sloping upward. The facility is supposed to be near this depth.” Rekha countered.

“How far are we from our entrance?” Alandris asked.

Rekha consulted the map that the computer was compiling. “We’ve nearly circled the entire cavern. There’s another possible tunnel if we continue on this heading.”

Fingers tapped on a console. “We can always come back. Let’s check out the rest of this cavern.”

It wasn’t a tunnel so much as a giant crack that split the cavern from floor to ceiling. Near the center of the wall, the crack was wide enough for three reapers to swim side by side. Rekha sensed another wide area with impossibly large fauna.

“Another leviathan?” Venjie moaned.

“Let’s take it as a given that everything down here is worse than above.” Alandris rasped. “Our new normal is nothing to panic over.”

Their new normal. She hated their new normal. But Alandris was right. Nothing to do for it except to push forward.


End file.
